Collectors at Dawn
by jacksld850
Summary: The Master Chief and Cortana find themselves in an alternate reality and in contact with a mysterious black ops organization. Events soon spiral out of their control as they're forced into another battle for another humanity's survival.
1. Prologue

Author's note: so i know I've been bouncing back and forth between a T rating and an M rating and the reason for that was because I always considered my story to be a hard T or a soft M because so far most of the content has been relatively mild except for my language in the description and even that is toned down for me. That's changing because I'm going to be taking the story in a darker direction and the latest mini chapter I'm putting up is going to be set over a decade into the Reaper war.

* * *

Spartan-117 woke up with a massive headache. At least he wasn't dead. Despite telling Cortana otherwise, he didn't expect to make it when the Halo fired. Then a voice called to him, it was faint as if he were underwater. He shook his head clear, it helped a little bit. He could make out words now. "Chief! Can you hear me?" Cortana was pleading now. The Master Chief turned on his helmet lights, a single beam of light in the darkness. It was then that he realized that he was floating. So the gravity was out, at least temporarily. Lovely.

"I thought I'd lost you too," Cortana said as he floated towards her. Years of training had taught him to move with perfect precision and grace that would make a dancer envious. It was necessary when operating in zero-gravity.

"What happened?" He asked.

"I'm not sure," his AI companion replied. Well that's a first. "When Halo fired, it shook itself to pieces… did a number on the Ark. The portal couldn't contain itself. We made it through just as it collapsed." John looked around at the wreckage. "Some of us made it." The Forward Unto Dawn had been cut in half by the Slip-Space portal. The Spartan floated from room to room searching for their Sangheili companion.

"The Arbiter?" he asked. The Master Chief was already sure of the answer. Cortana shook her head. He moved towards the cryo bay.

"But you did it. Truth and the Covenant… the Flood… It's finished." She said it with a strange mixture of hope and sadness that the Master Chief had never heard from her before. At least it was an improvement from how he had found her on High Charity.

"It's finished," he agreed. The Spartan entered a cryo pod and tucked his beaten assault rifle into the rack by the tube.

"I'll drop a beacon, but it will be a while before anyone finds us... years even." The Master Chief nodded as he entered the cryo pod.

"I'll miss you," she said, her voice breaking. Is she malfunctioning?

"Wake me, when you need me." The Master Chief had been at war for as long as he could remember. He could use a break until they were found. The last few months had finally caught up to him and he was exhausted.

* * *

Before I get into the actual story, I want to put out some of the technical specs to the weapons to justify how things work out in the plot. This mostly involves changes to the weapons of both Halo and Mass Effect in order to find some kind of balance between the two.

Note: Master Chief in this story will resemble the Book version (specifically the Fall of Reach and First Strike) more than the games. In the books, he's quiet but witty and very intelligent in addition to being an incredibly fast, inhumanly accurate, walking tank. I'm not trying to make him completely overshadow the Normandy crew though.

I took the only measurable feat of a Spartan II in MJOLNIR Mark VI Powered Assault Armor. The Master Chief surviving freefall at terminal velocity twice. While I can't calculate the mass or gravity of Requiem, we do know the gravity and terminal velocity of a human on earth. 9.8m/s^2 and 53m/s respectively. The Master Chief is said to weigh half of a ton in his armor. ½ 500kg*(53m/s)^2=702250. In both instances, the Master Chief survived, the armor was uncompromised but his shields were overloaded and he had a concussion (we know this because he was knocked unconscious).

Freefall and bullet wounds are completely different animals when it comes to killing people. With good shot placement, a .22 is perfectly capable of killing a human being despite only having 100-200 ft*lbf (approximately 140-280J for those in communist countries) on the other hand, a 200 pound man getting thrown on the floor can have more energy but the worst he'll suffer is a bruised ego and maybe some real bruises. Unfortunately this is the only feat that I can actually calculate because of the gameplay vs lore discrepancies.

Again I'm going to have to assume some things. MJOLNIR is described as not being able to withstand many plasma bolts compared to the energy shields so I'm going to say the energy shields provide 75% of the total defenses while the armor makes up the other 25%. Since the armor was uncompromised, I'll say that the energy required to kill a Spartan in MJOLNIR Mark VI is 750000 J or 553171 ft*lbf for free countries. That's a huge amount compared to my previous estimate of about 103000J based on numbers that were basically pulled out of my ass. However it is still lower than the 15MJ on the wiki but the wiki doesn't cite a source. If I go with 15MJ then things go bad real fast.

Why are things bad if a Spartan's energy shield is so powerful? Well it means that an MA5C as described in canon, firing a 175 grain FMJ-AP round at 2790 feet per second should take 164 rounds just to take down the energy shields. Awesome, right? No, not really. Guess who else has energy shields? I'll give you a hint, we haven't been able to play as them since Halo: Reach. A Sanghieli is supposed to have shields about equal to if not slightly stronger than a Spartan in Mark VI armor. They are nigh indestructible to your average grunt. Grunt here meaning infantryman, not an Unggoy.

Now I don't know how the UNSC runs things but if humanity were facing extinction, I'd be fighting dirty to win. Whatever the costs. Geneva/Hague conventions and bleeding hearts need not apply. I get that the Spartans get special weaponry (according to The Fall of Reach anyway) but wars aren't won by those guys alone. They're won by logistics and maneuver and blood. They're won with combined arms and mixed unit tactics. They're won by an 03xx (Marines) or an 11x (Army) taking the fight to the enemy. At the end of the day, the entire Marine Corps works for the 0311 lance corporal and the Army works for the 11B specialist but they can't do their job if their main weapon is incapable of killing the enemy.

In order to fix this, I'm going back and re-calculating all of the UNSC weapons.

Weapon changes to Halo Canon

I made some changes to the weapons in the Halo universe for a few reasons. First, I made the weapon balance more realistic compared to real world weapons.

MA5 series assault rifles: The MA5 series is all over the map when it comes to damage so in order to reflect that, I've changed the barrel lengths between models. Second, there is no reason for a different model of the same weapon to be incompatible with the other's magazines so I came up with an in-universe explanation why the MA5B had a 60-round magazine while every subsequent model had a 32-round magazine until Halo 5. Also you may notice that the assault rifles now have a scope, that's because I figured the Smart-Link can fail sometimes, especially if somebody loses a helmet so you need backup sights similar to how in the real world the military uses an ACOG or an EOTECH/Aimpoint and has backup iron sights

All variants are closed bolt, direct impingement, magazine fed, shoulder fired, forward ejecting bullpup, select fire rifles that have a rail system for mounting a grenade launcher, laser sights etc.

32-round and 36-round magazines witch have consistently proven more reliable than 60-round magazines which were phased out

Are chambered in 150 grain MK211A2 7.62x51mm NATO High Explosive Armor Piercing Incendiary rounds

Equipped with a 4x self-illuminating scope with a Bullet Drop Compensator out to 800 yards as a backup sight in case the Smart-link fails

MA5K has a "carbine length" 16 inch barrel and 26 inch overall length

9 lbs 3000 fps 3000 ft*lbf

MA5B has a "mid length" 20-inch barrel and 30-inch overall length

10.5 lbs 3200 fps 3410 ft*lbf

MA5C has a "full length" 25-inch barrel and 35-inch overall length

12 lbs 3600 fps 4315 ft*lbf

MA5C DMR same as above but with a 3-6-9x variable power scope instead of the Elcan Spectre/ ACOG clone on the others.

MA5D has a "extended length" 30-inch heavy profile barrel and 40-inch overall length

15 lbs 3800 fps 4809 ft*lbf

MA5D DMR same as above but with a 3-6-9x variable power scope instead of the Elcan Spectre/ ACOG clone on the others.

Squad Automatic Weapon

Open bolt, belt fed, air cooled, long stroke piston operated, quick change barrel system chambered in 7.62x51mm NATO. Cyclic rate of 600 rpm

Equipped with a 6x self illuminating scope with a BDC and a RMR sight

20 lbs 3800 fps 4809 ft*lbf

BR55HB battle rifle: I've reduced the Battle Rifle's magazine capacity because it makes zero sense for a battle rifle to have higher capacity than an assault rifle, especially if they're using short fat rounds like they do in the games but I'm changing the caliber because it just makes more sense to use the same caliber projectile to ease the logistics like they would have to in a war for survival.

All variants are closed bolt, direct impingement, magazine fed, shoulder fired, forward ejecting bullpup, select fire rifles that have a rail system for mounting a grenade launcher, laser sights etc

Chambered in M634 7.62x63mm 165 grain Semi Armor Piercing, High Explosive projectile at 3817 fps out of a 25-inch barrel 5317 ft*lbf

Equipped with a 6x self-illuminating scope with a Bullet Drop Compensator out to 1250 yards

24-round magazine

M39X series Anti Personnel Rifle: This one stumped me for a while about whether to make it act like an actual Designated Marksman Rifle as the US military uses the term, or treat it as an antipersonnel sniper rifle while the SRS-99 acts like an anti-material sniper rifle similar to the actual game mechanics. I decided to go with the latter so the DMR no longer uses the same ammunition as the MA5 series assault rifle so it's not a DMR; now the M392 uses a much bigger round that hits harder than both the battle rifle and the assault rifle like it does in the games. This is similar to how the US military has anti personnel sniper systems that are chambered in .300 Win mag or .338 Lapua magnum and also has anti material sniper systems chambered in .50 BMG

Closed Bolt, semi auto only, direct impingement, reversible side ejecting, bullpup with a 10x self-illuminating mil-dot scope

.300 Remington Ultra Magnum 220-grain open tip match projectile 3853 feet per second 7251 ft*lbf or

110-grain depleted uranium Saboted light armor penetrator at 5350 feet per second 7000 ft*lbf

M6 series pistols: It doesn't make sense for a sidearm to be as powerful as a rifle so I've toned it down compared to the rifles however, it's still much more powerful than the real world counterpart Desert Eagle.

12.7x30mm SAPHE 310-grain projectiles at 1881 feet per second 2435 ft*lbf

8 to 12 round magazines

M6J Carbine: Details on the M6J are practically nonexistent so I'm making them up as I go. The only thing it says is that it's a select fire M6 with a 355mm barrel with an electroless nickel finish which extends barrel life. In this story, the M6J has an integrally suppressed free floating barrel with a rail system to attach an optic and iron sights as well as an IR laser.

12.7x30mm 500-grain FMJ depleted uranium projectile 1120 feet per second 1392 ft*lbf

12.7x30mm 310-grain SAPHE projectiles at 2576 feet per second 4565 ft*lbf

20 and 30 round magazines designed for use with M6J but compatible with all M6 series models

M7/Caseless personal defense weapon: The M7 in the game this thing is lethal at close range. In canon, it fires a tiny peashooter moving only a little bit faster than most handgun rounds do in the real world and I will just not accept that for a military weapon five hundred years in the future so I basically turned it into a more powerful P90 with the same capacity as the SMG in the games. Even upgrading this bastard to the 5.7x28mm round and multiplying the KE by 1.6 like everything else, there's no way it should stand up to anything else in the Halo Universe. This thing puts out a measly 672 ft*lbf per shot compared to the Assault Rifle's 4000 ft*lbf. I could upgrade it to a 5.56x45mm NATO round but that would lessen the capacity and seem like I'm making the UNSC seem too badass compared to the Mass Effect Universe. I promise that's not what I'm trying to do here. Also, the M7S from Halo 3: ODST will not be making an appearance because in order to make a weapon "silent", you have to capture the expanding gases (that's what the suppressor is for) and the bullet has to be subsonic so that the loud crack from the sonic boom doesn't get heard. That can work with regular submachine guns because subsonic pistol calibers are generally 125-230 grains which are twice the size of a rifle bullet so it can still do some damage against a human. Pistol calibers would be useless against a Sanghieli. If we take a 55-grain 5.7 bullet which is the heaviest that I know of and shoot it at 1100 feet per second (speed of sound is roughly 1125 feet per second so we're cutting it as close as possible), we have 148 ft*lbf. That's essentially a .22 long rifle with a better ballistic coefficient meaning it will fly a little bit further before hitting the ground and might do some damage to soft tissue. If we say that the UNSC makes these bullets out of depleted uranium, then we have a 92.62 grain bullet and 249 ft*lbs which is still .22 long rifle energy. The UNSC would be better off using the M6J carbine. In fact, I may go back and actually replace the M7 with the M6J because it makes more sense from a lethality and a logistics perspective.

10-inch barrel

5.7x28mm caseless 31-grain full metal jacket rounds at 3125 feet per second 672 ft*lbf

Downward ejecting bullpup

60-round magazine

Folding foregrip

Rail system to mount a scope and/or laser sights

M90 Close Assault Weapons System: I turned the shotgun into a bullpup because it's meant for CQB but it's basically the only gun in the game to be a standard configuration making it horrible for the job.

Soellkraft 8-gauge 4" shells 0000 buckshot 8000 ft*lbf of energy at the muzzle

8-round capacity (4" shells) to 12 (3.5" shells)

24-inch barrel

Bullpup configuration

SRS-99 Anti-Material Sniper rifle: I didn't really do anything to the Sniper Rifle except for the zoom magnification because it's just about perfect the way it is.

40-inch barrel

14.5x114mm MK211 1026-grain High Explosive Armor Piercing Incendiary rounds at 4175 feet per second 39703 ft*lbf or:

230-grain Saboted Light Armor Penetrator at 8000 feet per second 32679 ft*lbf

Four round magazine

Folding Bipod

5-10-20x variable power mil-dot scope

Bullpup configuration

M-41 Surface-to-Surface Rocket Medium Anti-Vehicle/Assault weapon (SPNKR): The only change I made to the SPNKR was giving it the ability to do things that the US military has been able to do for decades.

102mm High-Explosive Anti-Tank Shaped Charge

5x scope with thermal and night vision capabilities

Rockets equipped with Radar and thermal tracking

* * *

Mass Effect Weapons

I'm making some pretty big assumptions here since we don't have hard numbers to go on. If you look at the description for weapons in the game, it makes very little sense. If you take a tiny piece of metal and temporarily lighten it using a Mass Effect field in order to accelerate it, conservation of momentum (M1V1=M2V2) says that the object should slow way the fuck down as soon as they leave the mass effect field (the barrel). If you do the opposite and increase the mass then they would accelerate fast as fuck when they leave the barrel. The problem here is that using too small of a projectile moving too fast means that it's going to be turning into plasma and dissipating really fast so in my personal head canon, they're still going with the Small Caliber, High Velocity concept but nowhere near the extent implied by the codex.

If anyone reading this can think of a counter argument that would make more sense, I'm happy to discuss it. Also, I am well aware that there is more to killing power than kinetic energy but that is a very complex subject that is still a matter of debate today.

Now why are the UNSC weapons more powerful than their Mass Effect counterparts? Because the UNSC has a four hundred year head start and the UNSC likes big bore, heavy recoiling, heavy hitting weapons. No, seriously, find an M14 and try controlling that bad boy on full auto. A pistol grip and foregrip won't make much difference because it has twice the kinetic energy and almost three times the recoil of an M16. That's what they consider an intermediate cartridge.

Because of the massive boost I had to give UNSC weapons to stand against the Covenant, I'm also boosting the Mass Effect universe from my previous calculations, though not as much. Also, in this universe, thermal clips have always been a thing and after the Battle of the Citadel, they took heat sink technology from the Geth so during the events of ME2 & 3 they use a combination of the two so that if you fire rapidly, you have to eject a thermal clip and put in a new one but if you fire carefully aimed shots, you're good.

For those interested, the math used was x*y=X*Y, x*y^2/450435= 2.4*(X*Y^2/450435) where x=mass in grains, X=ME mass in grains, y=velocity in feet per second, Y=ME velocity in feet per second.

Assault Rifles

M-8 Avenger

I'm not really sure what backwards military the Systems Alliance is based on but I reasoned that the Avenger would be the future equivalent of the M4 carbine, the standard service rifle of the US Army and possibly the USMC soon (though the USMC adopted the IAR-27/HK416/M27 as the standard service rife which is a very similar weapon but more accurate and supposedly more reliable, the merits of which I won't be getting into).

M4 carbine 5.56x45mm NATO M855 ball, 14.5" barrel 62-grains at 2900 fps 1214.15 ft*lbf

M-8 Avenger .172 caliber 25 grains at 7300 feet per second 2914 ft*lbf

M-15 Vindicator

I made the Vindicator the future equivalent of the M16A4 partially because it shares the three-round burst function and because it hits just a little bit harder than the Avenger like the M16 does compared to the M4

M16A4 5.56x45mm NATO M855 ball, 20" barrel 62-grains at 3100 fps 1331.3 ft*lbf

.172 caliber 25 grains 8002 feet per second 3194 ft*lbs

M-76 Revenant

Shot for shot, the Revenant doesn't hit much harder than the Avenger or Vindicator but has a high rate of fire and large capacity, just like a LMG/SAW should

M249 5.56x45mm NATO M855 ball, 21" barrel 62-grains at 3200 feet per second 1409.5 ft*lbf

.172 caliber 25 grains at 8475 feet per second 3383 ft*lbf

M-96 Mattock

The Mattock is the equivalent of an AR-15 chambered in 6.8 SPC or an AK in 7.62x39mm because it's a heavier hitting bullet but not quite a battle rifle

6.8 SPC II 20-inch barrel 104.6 grains at 2867 feet per second 1909 ft*lbf (For this one I took the average projectile weights and velocities out of a 20-inch barrel because it doesn't have military ball ammo)

.224 caliber 44 grains 6882 feet per second 4582 ft*lbf

Phaeston

The Turians are loosely based on the USSR (they actually resemble the Prussians more but those guys never made it into the modern era of warfare) and in Mass Effect 3, the Phaeston does slightly more damage per shot than the Avenger. Also, according to the conversation with Garrus regarding L2 implants in the first game, the Turians wouldn't lose effectiveness by making things easier on themselves; they wouldn't seek to reduce recoil and switch to a smaller round but rather to master it. Given the above, I've decided that the Phaeston would probably be the equivalent of an AKM.

AKM 7.62x39mm M45 16.3" barrel 123-grains, 2421 ft/s, 1607 ft*lbf

.22 caliber projectile weighing 54 grains at 5834 feet per second 3857 ft*lbf

Athame

Athame is the Asari goddess of prophecy and fate, and the matriarch of the ancient Asari pantheon. This assault rifle is typical of Asari, very precise, lightweight, and with a high rate of fire but not as powerful as its Turian or Human counterpart. I found it weird that Samara would be carrying an Avenger despite limited contact with humans or non-Asari in general so I looked at the wiki only to find that there are no Asari assault rifles in ME3 either with the possible exception of the Chakram launcher so I had to make one up. The AN-94 is a Russian assault rifle that was designed as a potential replacement to the AK-74. However it has a very complex design so it will probably never become standard issue. The advantage of the AN-94 system is its ability to delay the recoil force until the fired rounds have left the barrel. This, it is claimed, enables more 'hits' on target under the most adverse combat conditions. The AN-94 offers a unique two-shot burst function at a stated 1800 rounds per minute rate of fire. The Nikonov mechanism fires the second shot in the burst quickly enough to allow it to escape before the recoil of the first shot is felt, thus potentially allowing the two shots to hit extremely close together, for example to aid in piercing body armor. It's too complex for your average grunt but it would be perfect for an Asari Justicar, as they're the love child of Special Forces and Lone Vigilantes who need to adapt to any situation and would be willing to put in the work necessary to maintain their weapon.

AN-94 5.45x39mm 16.3" barrel 57-grains, 2900 fps, 1078 ft*lbf

.183 caliber projectile weighing 23 grains 7051 feet per second 2587 ft*lbf

Sniper rifles

M-92 Mantis

It was a toss-up between making it the common .300 Winchester Magnum which is the standard sniper round in the US armed forces or the .338 LM. I decided to go for the latter because of how much more powerful it is than the Viper as well as the fact that, like the .338 Lapua magnum, it can be used in an anti material role in a pinch.

.338 Lapua Magnum 300-grains at 2750 feet per second 5020 ft*lbf

.264 caliber 125 grains 6578 feet per second 12048 ft*lbf

M-97 Viper

When compared to the Mantis and especially the Widow, this thing hits really soft. I figure making it the future equivalent to the .308 Winchester/7.62x51mm NATO round was apt. This thing works more like a battle rifle than a true sniper rifle when you consider the large capacity and relatively low stopping power compared to the Mantis.

.308 Winchester 175-grains 2645 feet per second 2720 ft*lbf

.224 caliber 73 grains 6352 feet per second 6528 ft*lbf

M-98 Widow

The Widow is less of an antipersonnel sniper rifle and more of an anti-material rifle which is described in-game as having too much recoil for most people to handle so I decided that a 20mm shell should work.

20x110mm RT-20 2006-grains at 2789 feet per second 34638 ft*lbf

.50 caliber 863 grains 6693 feet per second 83131 ft*lbf

M-29 Incisor

I consider the Incisor less of a sniper rifle and more of a Designated Marksman Rifle or a Special Purpose rifle because of its absurdly low damage per shot (for the class of weapon) but it does fire in three-round bursts so it does more damage per trigger pull than the Viper like how three 5.56 rounds will do more damage than a 7.62 NATO round

MK 12 SPR 5.56x45mm NATO MK 262 Mod 1 20" barrel 77-grains at 2870 feet per second 1409.5 ft*lbf

.172 caliber 32 grains 6895 feet per second 3382 ft*lbf

Submachine Guns: The poor man's assault rifle. All numbers are for an 8 inch barrel

M-4 Shuriken

The weakest of the three submachine guns in the game uses the weakest of the three common pistol calibers.

9x19mm Parabellum 124-grains at 1329 feet per second 486 ft*lbf

.25 caliber 52 grains at 3188 feet per second 1166 ft*lbf

M-9 Tempest

.45 Super instead of .45 ACP because while the .45 ACP is great, it's a little outdated.

230 grains 1249 feet per second 797 ft*lbf

.355 caliber 96 grains 2999 feet per second 1913 ft*lbf

M-12 Locust

A jack of all trades that isn't particularly good at anything just like the .40 S&W

.40 S&W Submachine gun 165 grains 1293 fps 612 ft*lbf

.313 caliber 69 grains 3150 fps 1378 ft*lbf

Shotguns: This is self explanatory. In real life there are three common 12-gauge shell lengths so I gave the shortest to the weakest of the three normal shotguns to the weakest and so on.

M-27 Scimitar

12-gauge 2.75" shells 2935 ft*lbs

7044 ft*lbf

M-23 Katana

12-gauge 3" shells 3202 ft*lbs

7685 ft*lbf

M-22 Eviscerator

12-gauge 3.5" shells 3735 ft*lbs

8964 ft*lbf

M-300 Claymore

Lore describes the Claymore as being ridiculously overpowered and with arm-breaking recoil. In-game it's strong but nowhere near strong enough to justify the single-shot capacity. Fuck that noise. This thing is going to be as ridiculously powerful as the codex tells us it is.

3-gauge 5.5" shells 15144 ft*lbf (estimated based on a scaled up 12-gauge 3.5" shell)

36346 ft*lbf

Heavy Pistols: Mass Effect 2 & 3 go out of their way to call the sidearms Heavy Pistols and they hit harder than the SMGs do (I know that it could simply be game mechanics but I'm assuming otherwise for now). To represent this, I'm going to say that they use the stronger auto-loading calibers. All numbers for a 5 inch barrel

M-3 Predator

10mm is possibly the perfect pistol cartridge with its versatility. This bad boy can be used effectively against all kinds of predators, both two-legged and four-legged. Sadly, the FBI decided it was too stout for their effeminate wrists and down loaded it until Smith and Wesson came out with the .40 Short and Weak because of all the unused space left in the casing. You'll often find that factory loads are fairly tame. Only a few manufacturers offer real 10mm auto.

10mm Auto 180-grains at 1386 feet per second 768 ft*lbf

.312 caliber 75 grains 3328 feet per second 1843 ft*lbf

M-6 Carnifex Hand Cannon

.40 super is the even bigger brother to the 10mm. It's got too much recoil for most people to handle but with proper shot placement, it can stop most North American animals dead in their tracks. Fun fact, at one point it was called the .40 Sig because it has very similar design principles to the .357 Sig

.40 Super 180-grains at 1558 feet per second 971 ft*lbf

.312 caliber 75 grains 3742 feet per second 2330 ft*lbf

M-5 Phalanx

In ME2, the Phalanx was stronger than the Carnifex but in ME3 it was weaker, since this story is mostly taking place in the former, I'm going with stronger and the .460 Rowland packs .44 magnum stopping power in a semiautomatic pistol. Why? Because fuck you, fuck your cover, fuck the two guys behind you, and fuck my wrists that's why. I consider the weaker stopping power in 3 to be similar to going from .460 to .45 Super. Still a strong cartridge but it doesn't even make .40 Super or 10mm kinetic energy levels. On a side note, you are perfectly capable of firing .45 Super or even .45 ACP out of a .460 Rowland. However do not fire a .460 Rowland out of anything except for a firearm specifically designed for it. Unless you don't like your hands.

.460 Rowland 255-grains at 1342 feet per seconds 1019 ft*lbf

.355 caliber 106 grains 3219 feet per second 2446 ft*lbf

* * *

The M-8 Avenger has a rate of fire of 850 rounds/minute and takes about 1.2 seconds of sustained fire to take down Shepard's shields in Insanity which is 17 rounds for a total of 49538 or round it up to 50000 ft*lbf if my previous assumptions were anywhere near the ballpark (again, lack of hard numbers make this a pain). Cerberus has a lot of highly advanced technology so if we say that is the "normal" shield strength and Shepard and his team get shields 50% stronger than normal from their nefarious buddies, we can say that Shepard and co. have 75000 ft*lbf shield strength. That's not weak by any means. That's strong enough to take 5 modern day .50 BMG rounds and still not collapse. Remember that the Master Chief's shields were reverse engineered from Covenant technology which in turn was reverse engineered from Forerunner technology. Forerunners make the Reapers look like kindergarteners.

* * *

Also, the Mass Effect weapons will perform better against armor while conventional weapons will perform better against shields and flesh. This is inline with current ballistics studies to my knowledge. As a general rule of thumb, speed beats armor while mass beats flesh. As long as we're comparing bullets of similar construction fired at rifle velocities that is. Large, heavy, relatively slow projectiles tend to penetrate through ballistic gelatin and other liquid - like substances better while M193 55 grain 5.56x45mm NATO fired out of a 20 inch barrel (roughly 3300 fps) is notorious for penetrating body armor that will stop most other bullets.

I figure that MJOLNIR shields at least sounded like they were almost a non Newtonian fluid based on descriptions given in The Fall of Reach. I could be wrong


	2. Chapter 01

Captain Palmer of an exploratory vessel without a name wasn't a part of any formal military. In fact, Captain Palmer wasn't even his real name but he had stopped using his birth name ever since the First Contact War over thirty years ago. These days he was just a nobody who acted as a scout for a secretive organization. Today was turning out like almost every other day of his career. Boring. It was mind numbingly boring to the point that he almost didn't notice the static on the radio. The signal was using an algorithm unknown to Cerberus and that worried him. Cerberus had an information network second only to the Shadow Broker so if they couldn't recognize it then that means it was either the Shadow Broker himself or something previously undiscovered.

"Mr. Green, I want that signal decrypted and translated and I wanted it done yesterday," he ordered his Communications Officer/Cryptologist. Mr. Green wasn't his real name as far as Palmer knew but he didn't particularly care. Who the fuck names their family Green?

"Aye, Captain," Mr. Green replied, "I suggest moving closer to the source so we can get a stronger signal."

Captain Palmer agreed and piloted the ship in the general direction the signal was coming from. Several minutes passed before he heard Mr. Green growling in frustration. "Captain Palmer, the VI can't decrypt this signal. It's too complex."

"What do you mean it's too complex? We have the best decryption equipment Cerberus has," Captain Palmer couldn't believe that the signal couldn't be decrypted. Cerberus doesn't accept failure.

"The VI can't translate the signal," Mr. Green shrugged.

Captain Palmer grimaced, "We're going to have to investigate this thing ourselves." After several hours of traveling just slow enough that they could still pick up the signal, the LADAR scanners picked up the source. It was some kind of massive ship. Not graceful and sleek like most ships he'd known, this thing was ugly, blocky and packed with weapons. This thing was made to take a beating and give one right back. The problem was that the ship was powered down and looked to be cut in half. Captain Palmer immediately sent a preliminary report to The Illusive Man about what they had found and their plans to investigate further. The LADAR didn't tell them anything more until they were in visual range and the cameras picked up writing on the bulkhead. English Writing.

"Well what are the odds that an alien civilization uses English?" Captain Palmer asked nobody in particular.

"The odds are infinitesimally small, Captain Palmer," the ship's VI responded. Both men aboard the bridge looked at the VI with exasperation before ignoring it.

Captain Palmer set out an order to the mercenary team aboard to clear out the ship of any hostile life forms and waited. With any luck, they would find something to shoot and stop making him so nervous with their… twitchiness.

Jack Schwartz used to run with the Blue Suns a lifetime ago before he decided he could make more money freelancing. Cerberus, always a group with an eye for talent, picked him up along with the merry little band he had gathered over the years after they had made something of a name for themselves. There were six of them: Schwartz himself was a weapons specialist; Alco Stephens was a tech specialist; Mitchell Westwood was a biotic specialist; Jack Li was an "infiltrator"; Jim Brown was a sentinel; and finally, Nate Plissken was the team's Vanguard. Between the six of them, they could perform any job. But they were promised action, not months of sitting around doing nothing.

The call to check out the abandoned ship sounded like a lot more nothing but at least they'd be able to stretch their legs. Still, he was hoping to shoot something with his Revenant. They had been given orders to kill anything that moves.

Deep within the ship, a blue light flickered to life on a pedestal before going dark again.

Schwartz had a bad feeling about the place. Some of the doors would open on command, others were unresponsive and he some parts of the ship had atmosphere while others didn't. The team came to a fork in the hallway. One arrow said Cryo and the other said Armory. Why this ship used English but didn't look like anything he'd ever seen before was beyond him. Schwartz sent Li, Brown, and Plissken to go check out the cryo room for any survivors while he and the others checked out the armory.

"So what do you think we'll find on this ship?" Li asked the other two.

"Probably a whole lot of nothing," Brown replied. Plissken was characteristically quiet and the three of them entered the cryo room. The pods were huge, ten feet tall and three feet wide with a roughly hexagonal prism shape. They were all empty except for one, the occupant was massive, covered from head to toe in green and black armor with a bronze visor. In the center of the room, there was a flickering blue light on a pedestal so Li went to investigate. Unsure of how to activate it, he placed his hand on the pedestal and a little blue woman appeared.

"This is CTN 0452-9 of the Forward Unto Dawn. How can I be of assistance?"

"Are you the Virtual Intelligence running the ship?" Li asked.

"That is correct," the blue avatar replied.

"Can you tell me what happened here?"

"Charon-class light frigate UNSC Forward Unto Dawn sustained massive damage when entering a Slipspace portal in an attempt to escape from CLASSIFIED."

"Who is that?"

"I'm sorry, that's classified," the VI responded.

"Is there anybody else on board?"

"CLASSIFIED," the VI responded.

Li activated his team COM, "Schwartz I found a VI that runs this ship. I'm going to bring it back for study. I've found a possible survivor in a cryo pod. Keep an eye out, we may not be alone. It keeps saying that info is classified. Over."

"Good job, the armory is locked down; we're going to see if we can find anything in the engineering room. Out," Schwartz responded.

"Now how do I take you out of here?" Li asked nobody in particular. He was pretty good with tech but it would have been a lot easier had Stephens been here. After some searching, he found some kind of crystal that he guessed was the VI's memory core. Maybe he could…

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," the VI told him. It wasn't a VI, was it?

"Who's going to stop me?" He laughed. Its attempts at intimidation were sad.

"He is," she pointed towards the giant in the cryo pod.

He laughed again, "Too bad he's on ice, isn't it?" Li then moved to take the crystal when there was a loud crash and a quick burst of gunfire. He turned around to find Plissken and Brown had their skulls smashed onto the floor but he couldn't see anyone. The giant was missing and glass of the cryo pod was shattered. He drew his submachine gun and looked everywhere for the intruder.

"I tried to warn you," she said apologetically.

When he looked up, he saw a green armored behemoth looking down at him before it dropped and crushed his spine.

Schwartz was bored out of his mind. This mission didn't have anything to shoot at so he was stuck playing babysitter to Stephens as she tried to interface with the dozens of terminals. She couldn't access any of the data, every time she tried, it would lock her out. She had perked up considerably when Li had told them about the VI. It would probably help the science team that was sure to follow them to access whatever data was stored in the ship. Still they were nervous about the idea that they might not be alone. None of them had seen anything but apparently that data was classified.

Satisfied that they had found what they came for, nothing, Schwartz gave the call to head back to the ship. Li never responded. "Bravo team, come in. I say again, Bravo team, come in." Nothing. "Everybody, weapons free! We've got hostiles!" As if on cue, the ship lights went out so they had to turn on their helmet lights. The three of them formed a circle facing outwards so nobody could sneak up on them. Schwartz readied his Revenant and the three of them slowly moved towards the exit. This was above their pay grade and Schwartz wasn't going to risk the rest of his team; Cerberus could take care of it themselves. Before they got back to the ship, they needed to either rescue or recover the bodies of their comrades.

Schwartz was the first one to enter the cryo room and the door shut behind him ensuring that he'd be alone. He was a little scared but very pissed off that whoever was doing this thought they could intimidate him with cheap parlor tricks. Upon seeing the state of his comrades, he was a little sick. Two of their skulls were pulverized, leaving headless bodies and a gory mess. Li looked like somebody dropped a Mako on him. Now he was seething. Somebody was going to pay for this.

From the other side of the wall where his team was, he heard hail of gunfire and the roar of a bigger weapon as well as the sound of biotic explosions. He wished he could be there to back his team up but knew they could take care of themselves. Now he simply had to figure out whether or not he was alone. Within a minute, the noise of battle had ceased so he called out to his teammates on his COM piece. There was no answer. Alone again, he waited for the door to open so he could kill whatever came through.

He wasn't really prepared for somebody to kick the door down and throw it at him. His shields protected him from the worst of the damage but he was dazed long enough for the man- no, the machine- to disarm him and lift him by the throat. If he weren't wearing armor, he's sure his neck would have broken right there. Sadly, it looked as if the machine had some questions. Well, tough because Schwartz was having a little trouble breathing.

"Who are you?" the machine growled more than spoke.

"C- br-!" he managed to gasp out. The machine let him down and trained his assault rifle on him. "We're mercenaries; we were here to scout the ship out for any salvageable tech."

"Why did your men attack?"

"Our employer doesn't pay for survivors," he knew he was fucked. It was just a matter of how long he could make himself useful.

"Who is your employer?"

"If I tell you, will you let me live?" he asked, not allowing himself to be hopeful.

"It can't hurt your chances," the machine told him as he flicked the safety off.

"Cerberus," Schwartz answered truthfully.

"Cerberus… Where are we?" The machine asked.

"On a ship," the smartass in him replied before his self-preservation could do anything about it. The machine pressed the assault rifle against his jugular. "We're in the Terminus systems, pretty far from any major colonies. Omega is a few light-years away!" This guy really needed a sense of humor.

"I need a ride back to UNSC controlled space," The machine let him fill in the rest. The problem was that Schwartz had never heard of a UNSC. Wasn't that something to do with history? Eh, he had failed that class.

"Listen, buddy. You're a long way from home, I've never even heard of this UNSC."

"Earth?" the machine asked. What did the UNSC have to do with Earth?

"Yeah we can do that," Schwartz couldn't go back now that he had told the machine that he worked for Cerberus. Black Ops are black ops because they stay secret and nobody talks about it. "First, I need to call my friends on the ship and tell them that we're coming, okay?" The mercenary pressed a few buttons in his Omni-tool that would send a copy of the mission's video back to the ship.

The machine nodded and brought the assault rifle back a few inches away from his face.

"You've got to leave now!" Schwartz yelled into his COM before the assault rifle tore him to shreds.

"Well that could have gone better," Cortana told him. The Master Chief nodded, he was preoccupied with the fact that the man had never heard of the UNSC.

"How long have we been drifting?" he asked.

"Four years, five months, and ten days," Cortana answered. Meaning she was at least five years old and possibly older. Is she going rampant? She seems fine for now but he would have to keep an eye on her. Five years is a long time but not long enough for somebody to have heard of Earth but not the UNSC.

"I don't understand," The Master Chief said. Cortana understood the unspoken question.

"It's possible that we were launched forward in time. Slipspace is funny like that sometimes and with the energy that the Halo set off, who knows what it did to the portal?" Well that's comforting.

"Ideas?"

"Go check out their gear; it'll give me something to do and we might have an idea of what kind of technology we're dealing with here," Cortana told him. That told him that she didn't know what to make of the situation either. Master Chief Petty Officer 117 got to work.


	3. Chapter 02

Commander John Shepard was having a pretty good day. He stopped his best friend as well as Thane's son from becoming cold-blooded murderers and managed to keep Jacob and Thane from killing each other. Really you would think that somebody who's main gripe with the Alliance was that they had too many rules and restrictions to have a better opinion of mercenaries and assassins, especially considering that he works for what many believe to be a terrorist organization. They would have to have a good heart to heart about the subject in case there was anything else that might mess with Jacob's focus on the mission. Shepard realized that he was frowning now, when had he become everybody's father?

He remembered his early days in the Alliance when people were expected to act like adults and deal with their own problems during leave. Then there was a push to become more "inclusive" and "politically correct" so as a young NCO, he was suddenly responsible for the personal lives of the Marines under him. He had hoped to change that when he became an officer so he could make some NCO do the job and it worked. But then he had to deal with evils so great that they had been all but unknown to him as an enlisted man. Paperwork. He gave an involuntary shudder at the thought.

"Commander, Jack and Miranda are having a disagreement… can you head it off before they take out a bulkhead," Joker called over the intercom."Is today the day that we tear the ship apart? I just spent a hundred thousand credits on the girl!" It was Cerberus' money but that's beside the point. Shepard made way for the elevator as fast as possible. He hated this damn thing, sometimes it felt like he could travel from one side of the galaxy to the other faster than one deck to another."Take pictures!" Joker said before the elevator doors shut. He thought about it for a minute. He really thought about it. The two women were both gorgeous in their own ways. The problem is that they may decide to kill him instead if he tried.

Upon entering the XO's office, he heard Jack yell, "Touch me and I will smear the walls with you, bitch!"

Time to cut it off, "Enough! Stand down, both of you!" Shepard shouted.

"The cheerleader won't admit what Cerberus did to me was wrong!" Jack growled.

"It wasn't Cerberus. We have no record of any installation trying to create biotic super soldiers. But clearly you were a mistake," Miranda shot back.

"Fuck you! You've got no idea what they put me through! Maybe it's time I showed you!" Jack was ready to explode.

Shepard stepped between the two of them, "My opinion is the one that matters here. You two keep a deck apart until you can learn to act your age!"

"She can't be trusted, Shepard. She'll jeopardize the whole mission," Miranda said.

"If we survive this, you two can tear each other apart. Until then, save your hate for the Collectors," Shepard declared.

"She'll survive," Jack said, "I'll make sure of it. Then I'll tear her apart myself" then Jack walked out to her little corner of the ship.

"Are you two going to be okay?" Shepard asked

"It's a good thing you came by when you did," Miranda conceded, "As long as she does her job, we'll be fine. Thanks, Shepard."

When he exited the room, he stepped to a quiet corner to talk to the ship's AI, "EDI, I'd like you to put out an announcement for everybody to hear: In light of recent events, if any member of the crew wants to kill another member of the crew, they are to come to me and we'll find a way to settle it. Are we clear?"

"Yes, Shepard, anything else?" the monotonous but strangely sexy voice responded.

"That'll be all, EDI, thank you."

"Of course, Shepard, logging you out," EDI told him.

He had a feeling that Miranda and/or Jack were going to kill him soon but he had more important things to worry about. Like feeding his fish. Why a warship had an aquarium was beyond him but it looks cool damn it! How he had ever gone without one was a mystery. The same could be said about eating actual food instead of MREs. As far as he was concerned, Mess Sergeant Gardner was a saint and could do no wrong.

While Shepard was feeding his fish, EDI interrupted him, "Shepard," she said."You're kidding me! Already?" he almost pleaded."I regret to inform you that none of the crew are currently bearing homicidal grudges against you or each other," she replied. "That was a joke," she added when he didn't respond for a few seconds.

He laughed in relief though he worried he might be encouraging her to make more "jokes" before he answered, "That's good to hear, so what is it?"

"The Illusive Man wishes to speak to you," the AI answered.

Well isn't that just peachy? He made his way down to the Conference Room which doubled as a Communications Room with a direct line to TIM himself. Shepard wasn't quite sure what to make of the man, he was smooth but slimy at the same time and certainly charismatic but something was just off about him. He couldn't quite put a finger on it.

When he found himself "in" The Illusive Man's office, Shepard was greeted first."Shepard, good to see you're doing well and have things under control," he said.

"TIM! How are you doing, buddy?"

"I'm doing well, thank—what did you call me?" he asked, not sure he had heard right.

"Well you see, TIM, The Illusive Man is kind of a mouthful and it makes the acronym TIM, so since I don't know your name, that's what I'm going to call you from now on," Shepard grinned, maybe he was finally getting under the man's skin.

"Very well, "TIM" will do," apparently he hadn't, "I'm calling you because a team a few hours from your position found a derelict ship unlike anything we've ever seen before. The mercenaries were slaughtered before the ship managed to get away. I would appreciate if you went to investigate to see who killed them and why and who knows? You might be able to recruit the people responsible into your cause."

"People?"

"The helmet cam only shows one person but he was separated from the others so it's possible that there's an entire team. Besides, that mercenary team was good and you might even have had trouble bringing them down by yourself."

"So are we saying that these guys were good enough to qualify for this suicide mission?"

"If Massani or Archangel had refused, they would be on your ship right now," TIM said between drags on his cigar. Shepard could really use some tobacco right now. He made a mental note to pick some up next time they were on a human world. For some reason the only aliens that had taken to the plant were Batarians. Queen Miranda would die before she allowed herself any vices and Jacob was a little too into his workouts to smoke which left himself, Zaeed, Jack and Kasumi as the only members of the combat team who smoked. Zaeed preferred cigars, Jack smoked anything and Kasumi preferred a pipe of all things. Shepard himself usually smoked cigarettes or chewed tobacco but would sometimes join Massani for a cigar after a well-fought mission.

"I'll get right on it; can I assume you've already sent the coordinates? Also, could you forward the helmet cams by chance? It would help to know what to prepare for," Shepard asked only a little sarcastically.

"That would be a good guess. I'll send it to your email. Good luck, Shepard," TIM said.

When the hologram faded, Shepard called for Joker to plot a course to the derelict and for all combat personnel to make their way to the conference room. That included Jack and Miranda provided that they could act like adults. Jacob and Mordin were the first two to enter the room, followed by Thane, Samara and Kasumi, and then Grunt, Shepard's adopted Krogan. Miranda was next followed by Jack, Zaeed, and finally Garrus."What's this about, Shepard? I was in the middle of some calibrations," Garrus said.

"We've got a mission from TIM himself. There's a derelict cruiser floating around in space a few light-years out from Omega. Our job is to find the people on board, hopefully recruit them and if necessary, kill them."

"So we're recruiting strays now, Shepard?" Garrus asked.

"This person or team took down one of the best mercenary squads that Cerberus had on their payroll," Miranda answered.

"Can I assume you've already seen the video then, Miranda?" Shepard asked

"Yes I have, Shepard," Miranda answered as if it should have been obvious. In retrospect, it was.

"Good, maybe you'll help me figure out what I'm looking at," Shepard said as he played the video for everyone to see. Miranda nodded with that grace only she could manage. God she irritated him sometimes.

Most of the video was irrelevant to his team so he forwarded it to the point where Mr. Schwartz was sealed off from the rest of his team. It started right at the part where it showed the bodies of three of the mercenaries."I think I'm going to be sick," Kasumi said, leaning into Jacob who looked at it dispassionately.

"Cool!" Jack said.

Grunt just gave that creepy laugh and twitched.

Miranda stopped the video before she began talking, "As we can see here, we're dealing with something not only strong but very heavy as well. Earlier in the video, Mr. Li discovered what he believed to be a large mech in one of the cryo pods. It broke out of the pod and apparently overpowered the two closest to it within seconds if not less. Li reported that he had found some sort of VI interface on that pedestal and probably placed some tools on top of it while he was working. He was probably trying to get the VI's data chip. However, look at the haphazard way that they're strewn about. That leads me to believe that he was startled while working which is why he is several feet away from the pedestal. The mech or creature must move impossibly fast because those marks on his shoulders look like some kind of boot prints so the creature managed so smash the skulls of those two operatives and disappear before attacking Mr. Li from above."

Miranda let the video play again. The sound of explosions and gunfire looked like they were bringing Jack some kind of… sexual satisfaction while Grunt was grinning maniacally. He needed to have a talk with the little guy… big kid. The last thing he needed was to wake up one day to find out that Grunt ate somebody. When the door was kicked down and thrown at Mr. Schwartz, Shepard was pretty sure that Jack had climaxed. The rest of the room was in shock with the exception of Grunt who was now doing his creepy laugh again and obviously Miranda who had seen the video before. She paused the video for another quick comment, "we don't see the blue glow typical of biotics surrounding the door, nor did Mr. Schwartz ever pick up Element Zero readings at any point so we have to assume that this was done with brute force."

She was visibly trying not to comment on Jack's behavior but it was obviously grating on her. As the video continued, a giant green armored being stepped into view, grabbed Mr. Schwartz by the neck and proceeded to interrogate him.

When it was over, Kasumi raised her hand like a school girl. Shepard and Miranda looked at each other, both wondering if she was serious. "Yes, Kasumi?" Miranda asked.

"Was this an alien race we've met before? Because I was able to understand every word he said," the space ninja asked.

"No, according to the report, this vessel had English writing which leads us to assume that this is some kind of a human ship. However, The Illusive Man says it's neither Cerberus nor Alliance which raises several red flags."

"Long lost colony perhaps? Predating Mars Discovery? Black Ops even Cerberus unaware of? No, paper trail absent. Project this size would leave signs. Cerberus trap? Possible, Illusive Man has bad track record of such things. Doesn't explain size, speed, or strength without Eezo," Mordin paused to take a breath, "further data necessary."

"That's enough for today," Shepard said, "By this time tomorrow I want everyone in the Cargo Bay. Everybody is going, we don't want this guy to sneak up on us and take us out like he did to those mercenaries. Miranda, a word please."

"What is it, Shepard? I didn't kill the woman," she said defensively as soon as everybody had left the room. There was no doubt about which woman she was referring to.

"No, not that. I'm trying to get that little display out of my head, thank you very much. TIM said that these guys were good enough to be on the Normandy for this mission. Is that true?" Shepard asked.

Miranda laughed, "Of course not, they were barely above thugs. We would have gone to Eclipse first."

"Why did he tell me otherwise?" He asked.

Miranda shrugged, how not Miranda-like of her, "Shepard, I won't pretend to know why he does many of the things that he does but he always has his reasons. If I had to guess, it would be so that you didn't contradict me when I said how good they were."

"So why did you tell them it was one of the best mercenary teams Cerberus has?"

"Because while those thugs may be good at killing, they grossly mishandled the situation and got themselves killed. But the crew needs to take this threat seriously."

"Fair enough," Shepard conceded, "That will be all, Ms. Lawson."

"Shepard," she said politely as she walked back to her office."

* * *

"Well, Chief, I've been able to access their wrist computers. Apparently they call them "Omni-tools" and it does all sorts of little tricks. It's got nothing on your MJOLNIR so don't worry about that. However, it does contain something called a codex which is like an encyclopedia of everything galactic civilization knows. Now I'm afraid I've got some bad news."

Spartan-117 paused his MA5C maintenance to look at her, wordlessly saying, "Worse news than an intelligent extragalactic parasite that wants to consume the galaxy? Or a Monitor going crazy and killing one of my only friends?"

"Right, well it looks like the UNSC doesn't exist here which I kind of suspected when that guy knew about Earth but not the UNSC. Instead, the military representative of humanity is called the Systems Alliance, an organization that can't seem to decide if they're Army, Navy, or Marines and has a weird habit of putting officers on the front lines." What is this, Starship Troopers? "Anyway that's not the weirdest part, according to this, the year is 2187 CE but humanity has been able to achieve FTL and colonize planets because of the discovery of Element zero and a Prothean station on Mars, if you substitute Protheans for Forerunners, you'll have a pretty good idea of what they are. It also looks like all technology is based off of this substance called Element Zero or Eezo for short. No connection to Neutronium. This Element Zero creates what the locals call a 'mass effect' field which, depending on the charge, raises or lowers the mass of a given system. The people here seem to really hate AIs for some reason so if we're ever found, I'm afraid you're going to have to do the talking. Now time for the best part: are you ready?"

Master Chief Petty Officer Spartan-117 looked at her again. "Oh, grow a sense of humor. Anyway, it looks like the human race is part of a collection of species that make up galactic civilization and answer to a small council of a single representative from the top four races." Spartan-117 growled as he finished cleaning his rifle. It sounded too similar to the Covenant for him. Sure he had worked with aliens before but it left a bad taste in his mouth. There was exactly one alien that he respected and for all they knew, the Arbiter was dead.

While Cortana ran tests on the new weapons they had acquired, the Master Chief ran a catalog of everything in the Dawn's armory; there were two dozen MA5C variants, and a half dozen of both MA5D and MA5B variants in addition to enough spare parts to make another of any variant; a half dozen BR55HB battle rifles with enough spare parts to make two more and to turn four into a BR85HB; a half dozen M392 Designated Marksman Rifles with the spare parts to make one more and to turn one into a M395 DMR; three M6D series pistols; four M6J carbines; Four M90 Close Assault Weapons Systems with the spare parts to make two more; two SRS-99 Anti-Material Sniper Rifles with the spare parts to make one more; two M-41 Surface-to-Surface Rocket Medium Anti-Vehicle/Assault Weapons: and one M6 Grindell/Galilean Nonlinear Rifle. Sadly, the armory was under stocked from the assault on the Ark. Still, there was enough ammunition to last a few missions: 40000 rounds of 7.62x51mm NATO; 30000 rounds of .300 WSM; 20000 rounds of .300 Lapua Magnum, one-fifth were open tip match projectiles, the rest were High Explosive Armor Piercing Incendiary rounds; 20000 rounds of 12.7x30mm SAPHE rounds; 3000 rounds of 4" 8-gauge shells and 500 rounds of 3.5" shells; 6000 14.5x114mm High Explosive Armor Piercing Incendiary rounds: 2000 102mm High-Explosive Anti-Tank Shaped charges; finally there were two extra power cells for the Spartan Laser so that would have to be saved for a special occasion.

"Chief, I've finished running diagnostics on those weapons," Cortana said as he finished his work. He grunted in acknowledgement and as a signal for her to continue. "The bigger rifle that our little bird carried is called the M-76 Revenant. It's essentially a Light Machinegun, big, heavy, moderately powerful "bullets" and a blistering 900 RPM. Here we have a M-96 Mattock; it's something of a heavy hitting assault rifle for this world with a cyclic rate of 800 RPM but it's semiautomatic only. Next is the M-8 Avenger; it's the standard assault rifle of the Alliance and is okay at everything but nothing to really write home about."

She moved on to Sniper rifles, "This here is called M-29 Incisor and I'm not sure how to classify it. It seems like a Special Purpose Rifle but is constantly referred to as a Sniper rifle in the codex. It shoots "bullets" of equal power to the Revenant in three round bursts." Well that's odd, just throwing a scope on an assault rifle doesn't make a sniper rifle. "Next we have the M-92 Mantis, this is more of a traditional sniper rifle and hits roughly three times as hard as the other two. Our last Sniper rifle is the M-97 Viper; it's more of a battle rifle but the Codex insists on calling it a Sniper rifle, anyway it hits about as hard as your MA5C."

"The next category is submachine guns; we have the M-9 Tempest which is about as powerful as your M6J carbine when firing subsonic and the M-4 Shuriken which hits almost as hard. Next we have a M-22 Eviscerator shotgun as well as a M-23 Katana shotgun. The Eviscerator hits harder but the Katana has a higher capacity so if you have to drop your M90 for any reason, those are your options." The Master Chief nodded.

" Now we have three of the more common Heavy Pistol models; first is the M-3 Predator which has recoil roughly similar to a 10mm auto; next is the M-6 Carnifex which is the Predator's big brother; finally, we have both of their daddy, the M-5 Phalanx which has equal capacity to the Carnifex but a slower cyclic rate and more stopping power."

"Should I switch?" He asked.

"Not so long as you can feed your own guns since they hit harder than their native counterparts," Cortana answered.

"Any advantages?" He asked.

"Reloading is faster, function check is simpler, no need to carry extra magazines as long as you have thermal clips which are much lighter and smaller than magazines so you can carry more of them. The ammunition is a metal block that an internal mechanism takes shavings off of and then magnetically accelerates them under a 'mass effect' field. There is also less of a need to lead your target since the bullets travel faster. Essentially, if you think you're going to be overrun by grunts, take the Eezo weapons but if you're going after Elites and Brutes, stick to UNSC goods. Assuming you come into a supply of thermal clips, that is." The Master Chief nodded again. "Chief, we've got incoming," Cortana said after a few minutes.


	4. Chapter 03

"Shepard, we're coming up on the derelict. You were right, it's big, ugly and has English writing," Joker said over the Intercom. That was their cue. Shepard thanked him and made his way down to the shuttle bay where everyone was waiting for him.

"Miranda, Garrus, Jacob, and Zaeed, you're coming with me on the first shuttle. After that, the pilot will double back to pick up the rest of you. Clear?" There was a combination of grunts, shrugs, and "yes, Shepard's". He never thought he'd miss the Alliance. This lack of discipline was starting to grate on him. "You all sound so enthusiastic. Cheer up, with any luck, we won't have to kill anybody," Shepard said.

"How would that be lucky?" Jack asked. Of course she did, Shepard forgot he was talking to a group of psychopaths.

"Jack, you're here because we like to have insurance against things being unlucky so you might get to kill something after all," She grunted and took a swig out of her flask. He had half a mind to tell her not to drink on the job but decided against it. As long as she does well, he didn't care.

"Shepard, I should inform you that The Illusive Man gave me orders to attempt to make amends to these people on behalf of our organization. He was rather displeased with the mercenaries," Miranda told him during the shuttle ride. Shepard nodded; he doesn't really care what she does as long as she informs him and doesn't jeopardize the mission.

It took several minutes of waiting around for the shuttle to deliver everybody, meanwhile, Shepard and the others set up a defense perimeter, two watched the airlock, and two watched the gaping hole that they had come in from.

"Do you have any idea what caused the damage?" Shepard asked aloud.

"It's too neat for it to be an impact and I don't see any evidence of thermal damage so I doubt it was a Reaper's thanix cannon. It's almost as if part of the ship simply ceased to exist," Miranda answered.

"Well that's comforting," he replied. When everybody was aboard the derelict ship, they split into fireteams of three and entered through the airlock. Upon entering the hallway, Shepard noticed the starkness of the ship's interior. It was plain, grey and ugly, with no efforts spent on creature comforts. There was no style to it, just pure utilitarianism. It would have looked identical had the Soviet Union built it.

"I don't want to fight you," a deep gravelly voice said over an intercom.

"Good," Shepard answered, "we were hoping we wouldn't have to fight."

"Why did your organization attack me?" the voice asked.

Shepard looked to Miranda, hoping she could answer the question. The Queen Lawson smirked at him before doing so, "they acted without our organization's permission. Our boss wasn't informed until after the mercenaries tried and failed to kill you."

"What do you want?" the voice asked.

Shepard and Miranda looked at each other before Shepard responded, "we want to help you out and figure out who you are. My XO, Ms. Lawson wanted to apologize to you in person."

The voice was silent for a minute before it answered, "Only three of you step forward. The rest of you need to wait by the airlock. The atmosphere is breathable to humans if any of you want to take your helmets off." Nearly Shepard's entire team did so. To make things easier, Shepard decided that Miranda and Garrus would be the ones to accompany him. Grunt looked unhappy about not getting the chance to kill anything. He'll get over it. The voice gave them directions to meet him at the engine room where they found the green armored behemoth from the video. He was carrying what looked like a Medium Machinegun at the low alert.

Might as well get the introductions started, "Hello, I'm Commander Shepard; this is my XO, Miranda Lawson and my good friend, Garrus Vakarian."

The Behemoth nodded, "Master Chief Petty Officer Spartan-117 of the UNSC."

"Do you have a name under that rank and number?" Shepard asked.

"No," Master Chief Petty Officer Spartan-117 answered.

So it's going to be like that. "Can I call you something that's less of a mouthful?" Shepard asked.

"Master Chief will do," the giant answered. It's too much to recruit somebody normal, isn't it? Shepard was really starting to appreciate Jacob and his healthy disposition.

"Well, Master Chief, can you tell us where you're from?" Shepard asked.

"Reach," the Master Chief answered.

"Reach for what?" Shepard asked.

"A planet called Reach. One of Earth's most strategically important colonies," The Master Chief clarified.

"Humanity has no colony by that name," Miranda declared, somewhat confused.

"I am aware. I'm trying to figure out what caused me to end up here and how to go back."

"Go back to what?" Shepard asked.

"Home," The Master Chief said.

"You're not making any sense," Shepard said.

The Master Chief was silent for a few moments before speaking. "After reviewing your history, I am under the impression that I am from an alternate reality."

For once, even Miranda was speechless. "That's a hell of a pill to swallow," Shepard said.

"Come again?" Garrus asked.

"Human idiom," Miranda answered, still looking confused. "Do you have any proof?" She asked.

The Master Chief was thoughtful again, "Your history according to your codex doesn't match up."

"Do you have any kind of evidence?" Shepard asked.

The Master Chief walked over to a console and input a series of commands before a video began to play.

"The United Earth government is a Constitutional Republic found by the United Nations in the year 2170 after the Interplanetary War, gaining full autonomy in 2204. The UEG administers Earth and its colonies throughout the Orion Arm of the Milky Way galaxy. The United Nations Space Command is the military, exploratory, and scientific agency of the UEG and absorbed the latter organization after the Covenant attacks in 2525. The Covenant are a theocratic cultural hegemony of several different species with control over a large portion of the Milky Way galaxy.

The Human-Covenant war, also known as the Great War, was a major interstellar conflict pitting the UNSC against the Covenant Empire from February 11, 2525 until March 3, 2553. The war was instigated by the Covenant, who attacked the farming colony Harvest and glassed it, leaving behind nothing more than a boiling rock. Over the next few decades, the Covenant, with superior firepower, technology, and numbers, overpowered humanity on many worlds. The UNSC was consistently left on the back foot, winning only Pyrrhic victories. Humanity managed to escape extinction when the Covenant dissolved into Civil War and the Separatists brokered an alliance with the UNSC."

"That's an interesting video," Miranda said when it had finished, "but that isn't proof. We've been able to doctor footage since the 20th Century."

After a moment's deliberation, the Master Chief answered her challenge, "our technology has developed along completely separate paths. Your mercenary team remarked upon the fact that our ship doesn't have any of this "Eezo" that your society is completely dependent upon. Where you turned to Mass Effect FTL, my people discovered Slipstream Space."

"Is that your form of FTL travel?" Miranda asked. The Master Chief nodded.

"He makes a good point, Miranda," Shepard said while she was processing all of this. "Besides, you said it yourself, Cerberus would know if a human organization was developing something on this scale."

"How do we even know that he's human, Shepard? For all we know, he could be an elaborate mech or this whole thing could have been made by the Reapers or Collectors."

"Are you a mech?" Shepard asked the Master Chief.

"No," He answered.

"Right, because a mech designed to infiltrate our ship would tell us," Miranda said sarcastically.

Shepard rolled his eyes, "Can you take your helmet off for us?"

The Master Chief stood still for a full minute before doing so with one hand while the other raised his rifle in case they were trying to catch him unprepared. The three of them were a little thrown off by what they saw. He looked human but sickly pale and second only to Zaeed in scar tissue. "Satisfied?" He asked. Shepard and Garrus nodded but Miranda wasn't convinced.

"Is that even flesh?" She asked. The Master Chief glared at her as he grabbed his combat knife and moved it towards his face.

"Okay, I get it!" She exclaimed before he cut his cheek. "But I want you to submit to a medical evaluation when we get to the Normandy." He nodded as he replaced the helmet on his head.

Now there was one more question Shepard had before he could invite the walking tank onto his ship. How should it be worded to avoid pissing him off?

"How do you feel about aliens?" Garrus asked.

The Master Chief stared at him before responding, "I can tolerate them." Shepard noticed that his grip tightened ever so slightly on his weapon.

"You've defended Earth and her colonies before," Shepard began, "would you be willing to do so again in our world?"

"Yes," The Master Chief said instantly.

"Excellent! In return, I'll help you in any way I can," Shepard said.

"I have two conditions," The Master Chief said. Of course he did, nobody was willing to just help with no strings attached. Why did he have to offer to help in any way possible?

"Okay, what are they?" He asked.

"My weapons and equipment come with me," the walking tank said in no uncertain terms.

"Well I'm certainly not going to complain about not having to pay for a new set of weapons. How much do you have?" Shepard replied.

"Three and a quarter tons," The Master Chief answered. He didn't mention that a majority of that weight would be ammunition.

"Seriously?" Shepard asked incredulously.

"Six thousand, five hundred and fifty-five pounds not including the crates to carry everything," The Master Chief answered.

"…Okay. What's your other condition?" Shepard asked.

"We stay in system long enough to ensure the destruction of this ship," He answered flatly.

"You're going to scuttle the ship?" Shepard asked in disbelief.

"UNSC Emergency Priority Order 098831A-1 states that no UNSC ship is allowed to fall into enemy hands. If I'm no longer on board, I can't prevent that from happening," The Master Chief stated.

"Shepard, we can't let him destroy the ship! Think about how much humanity could benefit from the breakthroughs this thing can provide!" Miranda pleaded. Well as close to pleading as Miranda got which was demanding.

"If I decide I can trust you with the knowledge, I have all of the information stored in my armor," The Master Chief said. That seemed to placate Miranda for now.

"I apologize, Master Chief," Miranda said almost sincerely, "I would like to inform you that those mercenaries you dealt with, while on Cerberus' payroll were not members of Cerberus and should not be taken as representatives. I can assure you that my employer is furious with them."

"I figured," the Master Chief said. "I hacked their Omni-tools," he clarified when the three of them looked at him in surprise.

"Of course you did," Shepard said. The guy might not be much of a conversationalist but he is talented. He raised his entire team on the COM, "Everyone, we've got a new addition to our crew; he's big, he's mean, he's green and we call him the Master Chief! Now we're going to help him get his weapons onto the Normandy." Shepard looked up to find three pairs of eyes staring at him. Well, two pairs of eyes and a face plate.

"Shepard, I say this as your friend," Garrus said, "Never do that again."

"Tough crowd," Shepard shrugged before sending out the order to the whole squad to help load the Master Chief's gear onto the shuttle." It took a few hours to get all of the supplies onto the Normandy, during which time the biotic members of the party were invaluable, lightening the crates enough for two people to carry, or in the case of the Master Chief and Grunt, one person. In order to speed things up, Shepard split his team in two, half of which would be on the Normandy to unload all of the gear from the shuttle, while the other half stayed behind to load it onto the shuttle. He decided to keep Miranda and Jack separated from each other as well as Jacob and Thane. Just in case.

When it was all finished and they were safely on the Normandy, the Master Chief hit a switch that Shepard didn't realize that he was holding. The _Forward Unto Dawn_ went up in a brilliant blaze of light.

Unbeknownst to the others, Cortana and the Master Chief were having their own private conversation.

"See what happens when you listen to me?" Cortana asked smugly.

"You're better with words than I am," the Master Chief grunted.

"We should make you repeating after me a habit," the teased. "We may even be able to get you out of your shell!"

"I wouldn't bet on it," he said. He was right and she knew it but she pouted anyway. He could _feel it_. It's a funny side effect of sharing a consciousness with somebody.

"So I know you're not exactly excited about working with aliens but this isn't our world; they never waged war against us."

"Doesn't mean they won't try," he responded.

Knowing that he would be stubborn about this, she decided to change the subject. "What do you think of our new employer and his team?" She asked.

Spartan-117 thought for a moment before responding, "Unconventional. This Shepard character is charismatic enough to bring several different forceful personalities together. Some of them seem highly unstable and may become a threat at a later point. I'll have to see them in action before making a proper contingency plan to kill them all."

"You're such a caveman sometimes," she teased. "Miss Lawson is rather stunning," she said in a strange tone.

"Wouldn't know," he said truthfully. One of the "unfortunate" side effects of the Spartan program was a greatly diminished sex drive. It didn't matter to the Master Chief because it allowed him to focus on the mission at hand.

"I'm sorry," she said. Again, her voice was off.

"Are you all right?" He asked.

"I'm fine," she said quickly.

"What is it?" He was getting concerned now. She may be an AI but she's also his only remaining friend.

"I was put into service almost eight years ago," she said. "Smart AIs deteriorate after seven."

"We'll get you home and take you to Halsey," he told her in a voice that was not to be questioned.

"Chief," she pleaded. "Don't make a girl a promise you can't keep."

He needed to find a way to get them home fast.

* * *

In a forgotten corner of the galaxy, a heavily damaged but massive warship exited a Slipspace portal. At the helm was a Jiralhanae named Erinyes who had managed to get his ship and crew away from the Ark just before the Sacred Ring was prematurely lit, damning those caught within its reach to damnation instead of Paradise. The only problem was that they were lost. None of the star charts matched their location. As luck would have it, they managed to find themselves in the same system as a garden world so they landed on it in order to make repairs and gather food.

* * *

Note: when it comes to Covenant weapons, I'm going to be taking influences from Halo: SPV3. If you haven't heard of it, it's an excellent mod for the PC version of Halo: Combat Evolved. This is going to mean that the Brutes have their own versions of Covenant weapons in addition to what they have in the base Halo 2 and 3 games. Shout out to Masterz1337 and the CMT team for their great work


	5. Chapter 04

After the Master Chief's gear was situated, Shepard found himself wondering where to put the man. "EDI, is there anywhere our new guest can set up a rack?"

"The hangar bay is the only area with sufficient space for his gear," EDI answered.

"Come on, I'm sure we can be more accommodating than that," Shepard said.

"The hangar will work," The Master Chief said.

"Suit yourself," Shepard replied, "That's EDI by the way, the Normandy's own Artificial Intelligence. That's not going to be a problem, is it?" He asked.

"No, why?" The Master Chief responded. Shepard wasn't sure if that was a good or a bad thing.

"They're illegal just about everywhere," Shepard answered.

"Personal issue," Master Chief replied.

"Have you worked with AI in the past?" Shepard asked.

"Yes," The Master Chief answered.

"You're not much of a talker, are you?"

Fittingly, the Master Chief said nothing.

"I'll let you remove your armor in private. Ms. Lawson wants the medical exam done as soon as possible. The Med Bay is on the third deck," Shepard informed him before walking off. The Master Chief opened a crate with the power tools necessary to remove his armor when he noticed a faint shimmer out of the corner of his eye. He struck out with a punch that could have caved in a Sangheili skull. It was only Kasumi's quick reflexes that saved her as her kinetic barrier and tactical cloak were overwhelmed.

"Hey!" she yelped as she once again became visible. "What the hell was that for?" She demanded.

"Don't sneak up on me," he answered.

"You'd think a guy would enjoy a pretty girl watching him undress!" she yelled as she stomped towards the elevator.

"I wouldn't know," The Master Chief said.

"What's that supposed to mean?" What did that have to do with anything? You would think the woman had been worshipped by every man she met up until this point. She did have a very symmetrical facial structure and a petite body type so she may actually be objectively attractive. Before the Master Chief spent any more time thinking about it, the elevator door closed leaving him alone again. What an odd woman.

"I think you hurt her feelings, Chief. Good! I can't stand her!" Cortana said, suddenly furious.

"Cortana!" he snapped.

"Sorry! It won't happen again, I swear!" Except it was still happening, she went from normal to furious to scared little girl.

"Cortana," he said again, much softer.

"I'm sorry, I don't know what came over me," she said.

"Can I help?" he asked.

"I don't think so," she said before retreating into herself and going silent. Unsure of what to do about his friend, the Master Chief removed his armor plates, leaving only the Titanium Nanocomposite Bodysuit which he could easily remove by himself at the Med Bay. The medical officer in charge was a woman named Dr. Chakwas.

"Oh my, you're a big one," She remarked upon seeing his massive frame enter the room. "Miranda already told me I was to give you a full medical examination," she said. After a moment's deliberation she added, "I should let you know that I've been given orders to forward all relevant data to her terminal."

The Master Chief nodded, wondering if he had made the right decision by coming here. His biology was highly classified. It was too late to turn back now so he removed his bodysuit and let her run her tests. She tried to put him under using the standard dose for somebody his size, only to find him as alert as ever so she cranked up the dosage, eventually using enough chemicals to put down a blood raging Krogan. The first thing that Dr. Chakwas noticed was that his massive frame was covered in scar tissue. She started by gathering a DNA sample which showed exceptional genetics that rivaled that of Ms. Lawson herself. Next was a reading of different hormones and found that his testosterone and growth hormone levels were incredibly high which would explain his size, in addition, he seemed to have a variety of other hormones not present in any human she'd seen before. After that she ran him through an MRI and CT scan to discover that his nerves were replaced with superconductors, his muscles were extraordinarily dense, there was greatly increased blood flow to his eyes and his bones were… odd. Dr. Chakwas attempted to use a scalpel to retrieve a small bone sample only for the blade to break. Frustrated, she moved a high-powered microscope to the exposed bone to find that there was some sort of ceramic carbide covering large portions of it. "Well that's not something you see every day," she remarked. The doctor quickly catalogued her findings and sent a copy to Miranda Lawson as ordered.

Miranda was going over a file sent to her by The Illusive Man when her terminal alerted her to the reports from Dr. Chakwas. The Master Chief's augmentations were hard to believe. They were far more advanced than anything that Cerberus, her father or the Alliance could come up with. She wasn't fully convinced of his story yet but also didn't believe that he was a Reaper plant. The technology was just too different. Until she could figure out another plausible explanation, she would go along with it for now. After reading the data, she forwarded it to The Illusive Man and went to check on the latest addition to their team. That he was awake shouldn't have been possible given the amount of drugs that Chakwas had given the man but there he was, awake and getting dressed in a black bodysuit while the hospital gown was placed neatly on top of the operating table.

"I'm sorry, I didn't realize you were awake," she said.

"You wanted to catch me asleep?" He asked as he got dressed. The way his body tensed indicated he was ready to fight his way out of a bad situation. He must have thought she was trying to kill him.

"No, not like that!" she exclaimed.

"Well I was. Thanks for the show, by the way!" a disembodied voice she knew too well said. Both the Master Chief and Miranda immediately snapped their heads to the source, only to see Kasumi materialize just long enough to wink and smile before she was gone again. This time she made sure to steer clear of the Master Chief just in case he could see her even without his armor.

"She'll pay for that," Miranda promised, though she did so for her own comfort rather than for his. The Master Chief grunted in approval as he finished dressing. He then turned to look at Miranda with an obvious question on his face. "I came to see your augmentations for myself as well as to thank you for being cooperative. You have no idea the trouble I go through for my boss," she said.

The Master Chief was confused. Normally when people thanked him it was for saving their lives, not for making their lives easier. "You're welcome?" he responded.

"Pardon?" She asked defensively.

"I'm not used to being thanked," he said truthfully before heading back to his quarters.

That… was unexpected. Miranda went back to her office to finish her work, stopping by the mess hall for a snack. Using her biotics for so long had left her famished even though it wasn't particularly intense work. Shepard would make her regret that decision almost immediately. The accursed man was almost as insufferable as Ms. Chambers and shared her unhealthy habit of trying to get to know her. Unfortunately for her, Shepard was harder to intimidate.

"So how is my favorite XO doing?" he asked in the way he knew irritated her most. It irritated her even more because she knew he knew and she never failed to take the bait.

"I'm fine, how are you, Shepard?" she responded icily.

"I'm doing good, thank you for asking!" Now he was mocking her and she was wondering why she had agreed to bring this man back from the dead. "I do have one small favor to ask you though."

"Will you stop being a bloody annoying ass?" She asked.

"For now," he said, suddenly serious. "The Master Chief has some very interesting and advanced technology and I'm sure that The Illusive Man will demand that you 'acquire' a sample of it. Could you please not go behind the Master Chief's back if you do? I need everyone on this ship to trust me if we're going to make it through this mission alive. I won't even ask you not to try to get a sample of some data if he's willing to share. Sound good?"

She pondered his request for a moment. The man had a point, even if he was an ass. "Fair enough but Shepard, you need to have a talk with Kasumi and her habits of sneaking around the ship when people are asleep and/or naked."

"Was Kasumi spying on you sleeping naked?" Shepard asked while wearing a shit-eating grin. Miranda wondered if she should use her biotics to choke the man to death.

"No, she was spying on the Master Chief as he was recovering from his medical exam," Miranda clarified.

"So you were both spying on him sleeping and then saw him naked?" He asked, no longer able to hold back laughter. Miranda would have tolerated a chuckle but the level of joy he got out of the completely wrong idea that she was some kind of pervert was insufferable. So she used her biotics to choke him just long enough for him to stop laughing and drawing attention to them.

"You're such a child, Shepard!" She said while shaking her head.

"I'm sorry, _mom_ ," He teased. It became a lot less funny to him when he saw the look on her face as she went back to her office. Had he struck a nerve? She always spoke about the bullshit her father had put her through but never mentioned her mother. Shepard thought about going after her to apologize but decided to let her cool off first. He didn't fancy being force-choked again. In the meantime, he told EDI to track Kasumi's sneaking habits and to prevent her from doing anything that crosses a line.

When he made it up to the CIC, Kelly told him that Tali had been found and was having trouble with Geth on a planet called Haestrom. The Normandy immediately set off for the ancient Quarian colony.

The Master Chief had barely replaced his MJOLNIR armor plates when EDI informed that he would be going with Shepard and Garrus, the alien who vaguely resembled a Sangheili, on a mission to fight the Geth, a race of machines, and to rescue a friend of theirs named Tali. Having no idea what to expect, he grabbed an MA5D to offer more stopping power than the C model, he also attached an under-barrel grenade launcher and grabbed twelve 32-round magazines as well as ten High Explosive, Dual Purpose 40mm grenades. He also armed himself with a M6D Personal Defense Weapon System and five 12-round magazines. He then double-checked that the rifle's scope and iron sights were properly zeroed. Satisfied with his gear, and with 13 hours to kill, the Master Chief took a nap.

He dreamed of a massive creature who looked like the Gravemind but different at the same time. He spoke in a language the Master Chief had never heard but could understand somehow, "We meet again, young one. I am the last of those who gave you breath and shape and form, millions of years ago. I am the last of those your kind rose up against and ruthlessly destroyed. I am the last Precursor. And our answer is at hand." Then the creature disappeared and John found himself speaking through a voice that was both like and unlike his own, "In the name of the Mantle and all I honor—I hope it is dead, I fear it is not. They have unleashed it." _It spoke in a Forerunner dialect, one I could barely understand—archaic Digon. I remembered clearly what it said, but it took time for the context to become clear. Context spoke to me of the greatest of Forerunner betrayals, the greatest of our many sins._

The scene changed and he was back in Africa. This time it was a voice he knew all too well. "Do not be afraid. I am peace. I am salvation. I am a timeless chorus. Join your voice with mine, and sing victory everlasting." But this time, there was no portal to the Ark, no salvation, just the Covenant and UNSC forces being consumed by the unstoppable Flood. Even the Master Chief, with all of his augmentations, training, and power armor, was helpless against them.

He awoke with a start and nearly opened fire at the ghosts in his mind. The Master Chief realized that he had another twenty minutes before Vakarian and Shepard joined him in the armory so he tried speaking to Cortana, who was still unresponsive. That's too bad, not only did he miss his friend but she would be useful going against a race of AIs, though in her current state it might be better if she sat this one out anyway. He was worried about her.

Shepard and Garrus came down to the hangar in full gear, the Master Chief noticed that Shepard was again carrying four weapons and realized another advantage to this universe's weapons: versatility. That made versatility and logistics major advantages over his weapons, although Cortana had assured him that his would do more damage. He hoped she was right. The Master Chief asked Shepard if he expected to need some anti-armor capabilities.

"Probably," Shepard replied, "The Geth have a certain fondness for hulking metal juggernauts. One of their deadlier "foot soldiers" is a ten foot tall walking tank and they have an artillery piece on legs called a Colossus which is almost impossible to bring down with small arms fire. Whether or not we'll face one on Haestrom is unknown, the radiation from the sun is screwing with our scanners."

The Master Chief nodded and grabbed the Spartan Laser as well as one of the SPNKR rocket launchers and six missiles. "If we need it, can you call the shuttle to airdrop these weapons?" he asked.

Shepard nodded, "You may consider switching over to thermal clip weapons at some point. Otherwise resupplying you will be a bitch. We're lucky you have ammo to last a good while."

"I'll take it under advisement," the Master Chief answered as he loaded his gear into the shuttle.

"I don't know Shepard," Garrus said, "those look like some pretty nasty missiles. They're definitely bigger than the one I was hit with." The Master Chief looked at him, Garrus shrugged, "long story. I'll tell you some time after the mission." The Master Chief nodded and the three rode in silence. Garrus was fiddling with his sniper rifle while muttering something about calibrations; Shepard looked to be meditating and had a blue aura about him. So he was a biotic then.

The shuttle dropped them off in the shade, "be careful," Shepard said, "the radiation will mess with your shields so stay in the shade as much as possible."

The three of them rounded a corner and slingshot each other from cover to cover, sticking to the shade. They found a locked gate with a side door which Shepard opened, to find the voice recording of some an alien as well as his body and a few machines. The Geth, he assumed.

"Log: Emergency log entry: the Geth are here. I've stayed to buy the others time. Anyone who gets this, find Tali'Zorah. She and that data re all that matters. Keelah se'lai.

Shepard flipped a switch to open the gate and they moved on into a courtyard-like area. Almost immediately, a dropship that resembled a Covenant phantom landed in the center of the courtyard.

"Geth dropship!" Shepard shouted. They took cover and lay down gunfire to kill any Geth caught in the open and force the others to take cover and more importantly, not shoot them. The Master Chief told them he was going to move forward when the enemy was sufficiently suppressed while Garrus and Shepard lay down cover fire. He sprinted forward and shoulder-checked one of the smaller Geth, sending it crashing into a wall and shattering its metal frame. Then he unleashed his assault rifle on full auto into the other two. He almost missed a faint shimmer a few feet away so he sprinted and tackled the robot, which turned out to be roughly his size once the camouflage had been shattered. The Master Chief punched its skull and ripped out what he assumed was some kind of central processing unit. He looked back to his two companions signaling that the coast was clear for now and provided forward security.

"Nice work," Shepard said, "just don't be reckless. They're smarter than they might seem, especially in groups." The Master Chief nodded and allowed Shepard to take the lead again. Garrus spotted a cluster of Geth and hit them with an overload, leaving the open to Shepard's Biotic Charge. Not expecting the Commander to do… whatever it was he did, the Master Chief almost fired a grenade at him. "A warning next time, please," he requested, "I'd rather not hit you with a grenade."

"Fair enough," Commander Shepard replied as he emptied his shotgun into the Geth and Garrus and The Master Chief carefully shot at others around him. When they were dead, he pulled out his SMG and scanned for threats while the other two caught up with him. Garrus spotted something moving on the rooftops and fired a round with his sniper rifle, taking the Geth head off while almost simultaneously, the Master Chief's massive assault rifle shredded its torso.

They kept moving, wiping up what little Geth resistance there still was in the courtyard until they came across a Quarian body surrounded by those of Geth troops. A radio was squawking, "break-break-break. OP-1, this is Squad Leader Kal'Reegar, do you copy? The Geth sent a dropship towards OP-2. Tali'Zorah is secure but we need backup. We're bunkered up here. Can you send support?" Shepard then picked up the radio.

"This is Commander Shepard of the Normandy. Can we provide assistance?" he asked.

"Patch your radio into Channel 617 Theta. We were on a stealth mission. High risk. We found what we were after but the Geth found us. They've got us pinned down. Can't get to our ship, can't transmit the data through the solar radiation," Kal'Reegar answered.

Shepard tuned his radio and then asked, "What's the status of your team? How many of you are left?"

"We were a small squad; a dozen marines, plus the science team. We're down to half-strength now. Made the synthetic bastards pay for it though," Kal'Reegar answered.

"What brought you this deep into Geth-controlled space?" Shepard asked.

"You're asking the wrong person Shepard, I just point and shoot," The Master Chief could respect such an outlook, "Something about the sun. It's going bad faster than it should. Some kind of energy problem."

"Any idea where the Geth came from?" Shepard asked.

"One of their patrol ships found us. Dropships started raining Geth down on our heads before we could get off world. The system is under Geth control. We knew they made planetary sweeps periodically but we'd hoped going low emissions and the sun's radiation would hide us." Either the Quarians were sloppy or the Geth were good. The Master Chief suspected it was a combination of the two.

"Do we have to worry about the Geth sending in reinforcements?" Shepard asked.

"I don't think so. Their patrol ship hasn't lifted off again, and the radiation blocks all off world communication."

"How are you holding up? We can be there in a few minutes."

"Take it slow and careful. Direct sunlight fries your shields all to hell. We're bunkered down at base camp across the valley. I left Tali'Zorah at a secure shelter, then doubled back to hold the chokepoint. Getting Tali out safely is our top priority. If you can extract her, we'll keep them off you."

"You're going to throw your life away for research?" Shepard asked incredulously. The Master Chief had seen good men and women sacrificed for less.

"Negative. I'm going to give my life for the Migrant Fleet. All the difference in the world," Kal'Reegar answered. The Spartan couldn't agree more, the Migrant Fleet was the Quarian home since they were forced off their worlds by the Geth. Humanity had made a similar plan if the Covenant succeeded in taking Earth. Something about Project INFINITY. "I'm no tech expert, Shepard. I'm a marine. They tell me to shoot, I shoot. They said to protect Tali and the data. If you get them out safe, I've done my job."

"Hold position. We'll hit their back ranks," Shepard said.

"Careful, they have a Colossus," the alien marine answered.

"Understood."

"Shepard, call in the airdrop," Garrus said. Shepard looked to the Master Chief for confirmation. The Spartan nodded before pointing to the next area. It was swarming with Geth who hadn't seen them yet and some Quarians who were being forced to make a tactical retreat into a stone building. Shepard understood. They had to clear out the Geth first and then they could call in the shuttle.

"Normandy to Kodiak-1, prepare to make an airdrop. We'll signal when ready. Over," he said into the radio.

"Roger that, Commander, Kodiak-1 out," the pilot responded.

The Master Chief launched several grenades in quick succession at the largest groups of Geth, buying the retreating Quarians some time before a Geth dropship bombed a pillar and blocked the door. Shepard pulled some from cover with his biotics for Garrus to shoot. The Master Chief sprinted to cover and two hapless Geth troops tried to engage him in CQB. He threw them into the path of a Geth rocket that was headed straight for the Commander. A cloaked Hunter tried sneaking up to him only to get hit with a grenade in the chest and disappear in a ball of fire.

Garrus kept to his preferred duty of staying back and providing "supportive sniper fire" as he liked to call it. Shepard was pretty sure he was butchering another human expression but didn't have the heart to correct him.

Back on the Normandy, Miranda was watching the battle play out with great interest. It was inspiring to watch, she noticed that he seemed to be aware of everything going on at once as his weapon was constantly firing or he was engaged in a vicious battle of hand to hand combat. She doubted that she could take him in a fight even with her biotics if it ever came to that. She made sure to send a copy of the stream to The Illusive Man. He would want to know what this juggernaut could do.

When the smoke cleared, the Master Chief looked at the pillar. He wouldn't be able to lift it out of the way as it is but maybe some explosives will weaken it enough for him to break through. Before Shepard could say anything about a pair of demolition charges the Master Chief already fired a grenade at it, doing serious damage to it. A few punches was all it took to clear enough of a path to get through. Miranda could hardly believe such a display of power even though she had seen it live.

"Remind me not to piss him off," Garrus told Shepard, who nodded in agreement. The room inside was filled with dead Quarians and Geth and there was also a giant Geth platform that Shepard had mentioned. It targeted Shepard with a large machinegun that reminded him of Covenant weapons and even shot plasma rounds or something similar. Shepard dove out of the way, his shields were down and he was bleeding bad; Garrus did the same. The Master Chief on the other hand could feel time slowing down as the machine focused its attention on him. He fired his assault rifle at the machine and sprinted towards it, knocking the weapon out of its hand and elbowing its torso, feeling the satisfying pop of shields going down.

"Treat the Commander," the Master Chief told Garrus, "I'll take care of him." The Geth brought his arm down in a vicious swing that would have likely taken the Master Chief's shields down if he were still standing there. Instead, he was behind the machine and grabbed it by the waist, pulling it into a suplex. The machine wasn't made for grappling. Besides a Krogan, who wanted to get into a wrestling match with a Geth Prime? The Master Chief gave it a brutal lesson about the importance of hand to hand combat as he stomped on its chest repeatedly. Finally, the Geth Prime swept his leg, knocking him over for a second before it scrambled for its weapon. The Master Chief quickly recovered and broke the pelvic joint before the sound of Garrus' sniper rifle and Shepard's shotgun ended the fight.

"As fun as that was to watch, we've got to keep moving," Shepard said. How was he already on his feet? Unless he had overestimated the Commander's wounds, those injuries would have put an ODST out of the fight for weeks. Their Medi-gel must be more advanced than he thought. He should consider replacing his bio-foam with it.

"Hello? Is anybody there?" a feminine voice said over a console. Shepard and Garrus must have recognized the voice immediately as Shepard ran over to the console.

"Tali! It's me, Shepard. I'm sorry but everyone here is dead. Any survivors must have fallen back?" he asked.

"We knew this mission was high risk, damn it. What are you doing here, Shepard? We're in the middle of Geth Space!" Tali answered.

"I was in the neighborhood. I thought you might need a hand," he responded

"Thanks for coming, Shepard. It means a lot to hear your voice. Kal'Reegar and what's left of the marines got me into the observatory. From where you are, it's through the door and across the field. I got the data I needed and I'm safe for now, but I've got a lot of Geth outside."

"What's this research you're after?" Shepard asked.

"It's about this world's sun. It's aging faster than it should. I can tell you more about it once we've got fewer Geth shooting at us," Tali said.

"It looks like somebody sealed the door against the Geth, and the console is damaged. Can you get it open on your end?" Shepard asked.

"Yes, just give me a moment. Be careful, Shepard, and please do what you can to keep Reegar alive," Tali said.

"Don't worry," he said, "We've got your team's backs."

The door opened and the Master Chief immediately opened fire. The husk of a Geth Destroyer soon appeared where he was shooting and they moved on. Down the hallway there were little drones that reminded Master Chief of smaller Sentinels. They were much weaker but there were dozens of them. Between the three of them, they were little to be concerned about. There was another Geth Prime that was shooting its heavy assault rifle at the team. The Master Chief hit him with a grenade and finished it off with a long burst of 7.62mm ammo to its head.

At the end of the field, the three of them entered a room and through the window, saw a Geth Colossus just before it moved out of view. "Commander, call in the airdrop," The Master Chief said. There's no time to engage this thing with their small arms. Shepard nodded and did so. After a minute, the shuttle landed and the Master Chief grabbed the Spartan Laser.

They went down a stairwell and found a Quarian. "Over here! Get to cover," he shouted at them as he rose up and shot at the Colossus with his missile launcher. "Squad leader Kal'Reegar, Migrant Fleet Marines. We talked on the radio before that dropship arrived. I've still got no idea why you're here, but this isn't the time to be picky." There was a small explosion as the Geth shot at their cover. "Tali's inside over there. The Geth killed the rest of my squad, and they're trying to get to her. The best I've been able to do is draw their attention. That Mech of yours could do some real damage against the Geth," There was another explosion.

"He's not a Mech but are you sure she's still alive?" Shepard asked.

"Sorry, I didn't realize humans got that big and armored. The observatory is reinforced. Even the Geth will need time to get through it and it's hard to hack a door when someone's firing rockets at you. The Geth are near platoon strength, but the colossus is the worst part. It's got a repair protocol. Huddles up and fixes itself. I can't get a clear shot while it's down like that. I tried to move in closer, and one of the bastards punched a shot clean through my suit," Kal'Reegar said.

"How bad is your suit damage?" Shepard asked. The Master Chief remembered that Quarians have a frail immune system so if their suit is ever punctured they can die of an infection. It's a miracle Natural Selection hadn't wiped them out.

"Combat seals clamped down to isolate contamination, and I'm swimming in antibiotics. The Geth might get me, but I'm not going to die from an infection in the middle of a battle. That's just insulting."

"What can you tell me about the battlefield?" Shepard asked. In the Master Chief's opinion that was more important to know than some alien's possible infection. Rounds downrange is the best medicine after all.

"The right side's got a catwalk with a sniper perch. You could wreak some havoc from there, but none of my men made it past the Geth. The middle's got cover, but the damn colossus has a shot at you the whole time, and you've got Geth coming in from both sides. The left gives you some cover from the colossus but your ass is hanging out for the Geth. That's how I got shot."

"Any ideas on how to deal with the Colossus?" Shepard asked. Meanwhile, the Master Chief charged his Spartan Laser and stepped out of cover, hitting it right through the center of mass, utterly destroying it. "Well that simplifies things," he said. The remaining Geth tried to converge on their position from three sides but Garrus covered the middle, Shepard covered the left flank and the Master Chief covered the right flank until there was no more resistance. The team then entered the room Tali was in.

"Just a second, I locked the door to keep the Geth from getting inside," Tali said, "There, that should do it." They entered the room and she told them to let her finish the download. "Thank you, Shepard. If not for you, I would never have made it out of this room. This whole mission had been a disaster. I wish I'd joined you back on Freedom's Progress, but I couldn't let anyone take my place on something this risky."

"A lot of Quarians lost their lives here, was it worth it?" Shepard asked.

"I don't know, Shepard. It wasn't my call. The Admiralty Board believed the information here was worth sacrificing all our lives for. I have to believe they know what's best."

"I didn't ask what some Admiral thought. I asked what you thought." That kind of talk was grounds for execution back home.

"A lot of people died here. Some of them were my friends and all of them were good at their jobs. That damn data better be worth it. The price was too high," she said.

"What can you tell me about your research here?" Shepard asked.

"Haestrom's sun is destabilizing. Back when it was a Quarian colony, it was a normal star. It shouldn't change that quickly."

"Any idea what's destabilizing the sun?"

"If I had to guess, I'd say that it was dark energy affecting the interior of the star. The effect is similar to when stars blow off mass to enter a red giant phase, but Haestrom's sun is far too young for this to be natural."

"Whatever the reason, I'm glad I could help. Once you deliver that data, I could use you on the Normandy."

"I promised to see this mission through and I did. I can leave with you and send the data to the Fleet. And if the Admirals have a problem with it, they can go to hell. I just watched the rest of my team die."

"Maybe not the whole rest of your team, Ma'am," Kal'Reegar said entering the room.

"Reegar! You made it!" She exclaimed.

"Your old captain's as good as you said. Damn Colossus never stood a chance thanks to his friend here," Reegar said gesturing to the Master Chief.

"If need be, the Normandy can get you out of here, Reegar," Commander Shepard offered.

"The Geth didn't damage our ship. As long as we get out of here before reinforcements show up, we'll be fine."

"Actually I won't be going with you. I'm joining Commander Shepard."

"I'll pass the data to the Admiralty board and let them know what happened. She's all yours now, Shepard. Keep her safe."

The four of them left Kal'Reegar behind and made their way back to the shuttle.

"So what is it that you hit the Colossus with? Shepard asked.

"M6 Grindell/Galilean Nonlinear Rifle. It's a man-portable, anti-vehicle, directed-energy weapon," The Master Chief said.

"How does it work?" He asked.

"It shoots a lot of lasers really fast," The Master Chief replied.

"Fair enough," Commander Shepard responded as he laid his head back to take a nap. The rest of the trip to the ship was made in silence.

* * *

Another action scene was a long time coming but I had to get a lot of the exposition out of the way first. Please leave reviews on anything you think could be improved or if there's anything you would like to see. The Loyalty missions won't necessarily be done in the same order as they were in the game and neither will the main story missions. Some of the changes are for convenience's sake, others are just because.


	6. Chapter 05

Miranda was waiting in the hangar when they returned. Shepard had seen that look on her face enough times to know that whatever was on her mind was important. Before he could ask what was on her mind, she informed him that The Illusive Man wanted to speak to the Master Chief. The Master Chief, despite being on the other side of the room putting his weapons away, called out an affirmative. His armor probably enhanced sound for him.

The Master Chief walked over towards Miranda purposefully. She looked slightly nervous even though she was good at hiding it. She reminded him of some ONI agents he had met; more adept at espionage than anything but just as deadly as any Special Operative. "The Illusive Man is your employer, correct, ma'am?" The Master Chief asked.

"That's right. Now Cerberus has a checkered history and has done some questionable things in our past but everything is done with the goal of advancing and protecting humanity. We're no saints and will be the first to admit it but there's nobody else looking out for the human race like we are," She said.

"The Alliance?" he asked.

"The Alliance is too busy trying to decide whether to get on their knees or bend over for the Council. The other Citadel species hate us because they see us as upstarts."

"I see," The Master Chief responded. This universe was very different from his own but it seemed that a conglomeration of aliens still saw themselves as superior to humanity. He would disabuse them of such a notion eventually.

Inside the conference room, the table was retracted into the floor and the Master Chief stepped onto a podium where he found himself inside an office with a view of a red and blue star and a man standing opposite him. This man held a cigar in one hand and a glass of alcohol, probably bourbon or scotch, in the other.

"Master Chief Petty Officer Spartan-117," the man said, "it's a pleasure to meet you. May I call you Master Chief?"

"Yes. The Illusive Man, I presume?" The Master Chief responded.

"That's right. Am I correct in assuming that you're some kind of Super Soldier?" The Illusive Man asked.

"Yes but a lot of the information about the program is highly classified," The Master Chief answered.

"I'm sure Miranda has already told you but I wanted to apologize for the way our hired guns greeted you. I hope you understand that sometimes we have to hire less than savory people to do our dirty work but they did not have authorization to do anything besides scout out the ship," The Illusive Man said.

"So you hire idiots?" The Master Chief asked.

The Illusive Man chuckled softly enough that the Spartan barely heard him, "Apparently. Since the incident we've gone through everyone on our payroll and are working to get rid of anyone who can't be trusted to act responsibly. But that's enough of the pleasantries. I've brought you here for two reasons: the first is to offer you a job with us."

"I understand that these Collectors are a threat to humanity," The Master Chief replied.

"They absolutely are. For now I want you to stick with Shepard until the Collectors are defeated. But Shepard has no love for Cerberus. He's an Alliance man through and through and I respect that about him. But the Alliance is too busy ignoring the threats to the human race and bowing to our alien overlords to be trusted with humanity's defense. I need to build a military that the galaxy has never seen before and I want you to lead them into battle against the real threat: the Reapers," The Illusive Man told him.

"Reapers?" The Master Chief asked. Cortana hadn't told him about them while they were on the Dawn and hadn't spoken to him all day.

"I'm surprised Shepard hasn't told you. The Reapers are an ancient extragalactic threat that harvests galactic civilization every 50 thousand years. They're technologically advanced like nothing we've come across before and a single one of them was able to hold its own against an entire fleet." They sounded like the bastard child of the Flood and the Covenant. The Master Chief tensed slightly, just enough for The Illusive Man to notice.

"Do you have proof?" he asked.

"Ask Miranda to show you our files on them. I'm sure you'll be convinced. You can feel free to ask Shepard about them yourself as well," The Illusive Man said.

"He's right, Chief," Cortana said, "I've hacked into the files on board the Normandy, the Reapers, while not as strong as the Covenant on a ship-per-ship basis, could probably take over our galaxy if the estimates are correct. They have numbers in the hundreds of thousands if not more and they hit with hundreds of kilotons of force based on the one they've engaged before. Not only that but they seem capable of "indoctrinating" troops to do their bidding and turn against their allies. They also turn the bodies of their enemies into shock troops. Remind you of anyone?"

"The Flood," he answered. Between the Logic Plague that had corrupted Mendicant Bias during the Forerunner-Flood War and the Flood corrupting every organism it came across, the Reapers were starting to sound a little too similar. "It's good to hear from you again. Are you okay?" The Master Chief said.

"Not really but I can hold myself together for a while. I'm sorry, Chief," she said.

"You're fine," he said to her. "And the second reason?" he asked The Illusive Man.

"I would like to ask you for any data you're willing to share with us," he said.

"Why?"

The Illusive Man took a drag from his cigar before answering. "Because the human race is consistently being held back by established powers that are afraid of the progress we've made in the past thirty years. The Asari have technology that makes us look like we're running steam engines; the Turians have a military we couldn't match in one hundred years; the Salarians have spies in every organization, second only to the Shadow Broker himself. If we don't keep improving, we'll always be a second rate species to them. We've already seen how they treat species who are no longer useful to them. I intend to ensure that never happens."

"Cortana?" the Master Chief asked for her input.

"He's right, Chief. Humanity's progress in this universe is slowing down and their military is legally limited due to the Treaty of Farixen," Cortana replied.

"What?" he asked her rhetorically before going back to The Illusive Man. "What is this about the Treaty of Farixen and why did the Systems Alliance agree to it?"

"The Treaty of Farixen is a treaty forced upon the Systems Alliance by the Council when they joined the Citadel species. It limits the Systems Alliance' ability to create dreadnoughts based on how many Turian dreadnoughts are build. They have five for every three that the Systems Alliance is allowed to build and that was only recently increased from one for every five Turian dreadnoughts," The Illusive Man said. "If the Turians ever decide to go to war with humanity again, we'll be powerless to stop them."

"It's all true, John. The Systems Alliance is woefully outgunned and don't seem to be making too much of an effort to change that," Cortana responded, "We have asked you to give up your family, your childhood, your future."

"Cortana!" He said, trying to snap her out of it.

"I'm sorry, I'm fine," she said, "Giving the Alliance everything might not make too much of a difference. They're legally bound to share all technological advancements from their Protheans. They may be convinced to share anything we give them with the Citadel at large."

"So what do you recommend?" The Master Chief asked.

"Cerberus is a lot like ONI. They're unethical but they'll do anything it takes for humanity," she answered.

"That's not what I asked," The Master Chief replied.

"I would give Cerberus our unclassified data. The Alliance isn't as willing to protect their people," she answered, unsure of herself.

"I trust you," he assured her, "can you transfer the data to the ship?" The Master Chief asked.

"Of course I can, provided they have the storage space," Cortana said.

"You'll get your information," The Master Chief told The Illusive Man.

"Thank you," The Illusive Man said, "I look forward to working with you in the future."

The Master Chief walked out of the office and headed straight to Ms. Lawson's quarters. The woman looked up in mild surprise when he entered her office/bedroom. He had struck her as the antisocial type. Immediately, she received an email from The Illusive Man telling her why she was here. "So you decided to share some of your data?" She asked. She may trust The Illusive Man but still preferred to verify things for herself.

The Master Chief nodded, "I need a server to upload information directly to."

"How much memory do you need?" She asked, taking a sip of her coffee.

"A Yottabyte," he said. Miranda nearly spit her coffee out before regaining her composure.

"A Yottabyte? As in one septillion bytes?" She asked, wondering if there was some kind of discrepancy between his universe's method of measuring data and her own.

"Yes, ma'am. You use binary, correct? Translated, it would take approximately one Yottabyte in binary," he said.

"What number system do your computers use?" Miranda asked, curiously.

"Septenary," he replied.

"Why do you use a base-7 number system?" She asked.

"It works better with our Artificial Intelligence. The reasoning is above my pay grade, ma'am," he answered.

"We'll have to go to Earth to drop the data off. From there, it will be split into smaller chunks that can be transmitted to The Illusive Man," she said.

"Understood," he said as he turned to leave.

"Master Chief?" She called out, causing him to turn around. "I appreciate you helping us. You have no idea what this could mean for humanity."

"It means you have a fighting chance," he told her. Of course he knew; if he had told her anything resembling the truth about his origins, he would know better than anybody else on the ship.

When he left her office, she sent a memo to Shepard that they needed to head to Earth and that the Master Chief would be accompanying her. In the meantime, she checked the bugs for any suspicious activity among the crew. She wasn't constantly watching them but she did have to ensure the safety of the ship and crew. Curiously, she saw the Master Chief take something out of his helmet and place it into a disc. Nothing special happened after that so she checked on everyone else. Samara was in her perpetual state of meditation; Thane was staring out the window; Kasumi was spying on Jacob working out; Garrus was working on the newly installed Thanix cannon. Everything was normal.

She was about to get back to work when she realized that "normal" was the unnatural state of this ship. "EDI, is there anything that needs attention?" She asked the ship's AI.

"Negative, Ms. Lawson. Everything is normal," EDI replied.

Temporarily satisfied, she went back to her paperwork. Despite what Shepard said, she hated it almost as much as he did. She just whined about it less. However, his tendency to make her do his paperwork might get him shot one day.

Commander Shepard was checking on the Bridge when Kelly told him that Grunt and Mordin both wanted to talk to him about something. She wasn't sure but he seemed a little bit off when he said it. Shepard made a mental note to check on him when he finished making his rounds on the bridge. He walked up to Joker to find him turned away from the controls for a moment resting his eyes. "Sleeping on the job, Mr. Moreau?" Shepard teased.

Joker almost jumped out of his chair before realizing that Shepard was joking. "You're an ass," he laughed, "It's great to see Tali on board, Commander. Just like old times. It is her right? I mean because the mask… never mind," he said as he realized his joke had fallen on its face. He noticed something blinking on the console and turned around. "We've got some pressure loss in the number-four hydrogen tank. Lock it down, EDI," he said to the ship's AI. Shepard let him get back to work.

After hours of working on the Normandy's main gun, Garrus decided to take the rest of the day off. His weapons were already in perfect order after that last mission so he really didn't know what to do with his time. Then he remembered that Tali was on board now so he went to go find her. Maybe they could talk about old times and he could tease her about her crush on Shepard when she was still a teenager. She might try to kill him but he loved seeing her squirm. When he stepped out of the elevator, he saw a very antsy-looking Grunt step in. He thought about investigating but decided to let him be. He was still a kid after all. He's a really big kid that could bench press a Mako.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jack lurking in the shadows of the sub-deck in the engineering bay. He wasn't sure what she was doing but she was definitely snarling at him. When he finally found Tali, she was working on something in a maintenance shaft so he decided to wait around for a little bit and chat up Ken and Gabby, the Cerberus engineers who were surprisingly amicable. If he didn't know any better, he'd say they had a thing going.

"So, Gabby, what do you think of our new boss?" Ken asked his coworker.

"She seems really nice, why?" Gabby replied.

"Oh yeah, she's really nice with the suit hugging her curves in all the right places…" He replied.

"Who are we talking about?" Garrus asked, putting forth an intimidating stance.

"What? Nothing!" Ken insisted as he saw Archangel staring at him.

Garrus burst out in laughter at the look on his face, it hurt his face but it was worth it. "Just don't let her catch you "admiring her suit" and you'll be fine," he told the man.

"You've got it, Mr. Archangel," Ken said, relieved.

Before Garrus could respond, there was a loud crash from the hangar bay so he ran to the window to investigate and found Grunt locked in Mortal Combat with the Master Chief and that the Master Chief was toying with him. Grunt charged at him head on and the Master Chief sidestepped and smacked him on the back of the head. Garrus decided to warn him about the Krogan blood rage before he realized that Grunt was already entering it. Garrus called Commander Shepard over the radio, accidentally using the team-wide channel, alerting everybody to the fight.

Grunt picked up a metal crate and threw it at the Master Chief who caught it just in time for Grunt to rush him. Grunt tackled him to the ground and the Master Chief flipped him over and punched him in the nose. Grunt snarled before a second strike put him down for the count. When the Master Chief stood up, the elevator door opened behind Garrus carrying the entire team. The Master Chief threw Grunt onto his shoulders and made his own way to the elevator.

The team was disappointed at missing out on the action except for Shepard, who was exasperated, and Miranda, who was angry. Garrus had an idea. It was a horrible idea; it was the kind of idea that would piss off Miranda if she ever found out and would probably annoy Shepard. He had to go through with it. Garrus Vakarian needed to start a betting ring and a fight club.

Commander Shepard had buried his face in the palm of his hands when the Master Chief contacted him on a private channel, "Sir, I'm taking the Krogan to the medical bay for his injuries. I request permission to interrogate him when he wakes up."

"Granted on one condition; I want to be there when you do. I'm going to be watching the footage to see for myself what happened," Shepard responded.

"Acknowledged," The Master Chief replied.

Shepard and Miranda went to her office to watch the confrontation unfold, starting from when Grunt left his room. "You see that?" Shepard asked, "He doesn't look like himself. He seems even more angry and feral than usual. Usually he's got more self control. This time he was all animal." Miranda merely nodded and focused on the video.

They allowed the video to keep playing. Grunt walked up to the Master Chief and said, "You may be strong human, but I am pure Krogan!" The Master Chief nodded which seemed to irritate Grunt more. "I challenge you to single combat!" he roared.

"No," the Master Chief said. Grunt snarled and drove his head into the Master Chief's chest, knocking him over. Grunt tried pouncing on him, only to get a giant metal boot in his chest as the Master Chief kicked him away and got back to his feet and closed the distance. Grunt took a wild swing, which the Master Chief blocked and returned the favor with a right cross to the nose. Grunt blinked and tried to lunge at the Spartan, only to get thrown several feet and land flat on his back. Grunt quickly scrambled to his feet and charged at him, only for the Master Chief to simply reappear a few feet away from where he was before. Shepard and Miranda rewound the video and played it at half speed, only to still struggle to watch the Master Chief side step and smack the Krogan in the back of the head. Grunt stumbled forward and into a large crate, which he threw at the Master Chief and rushed at him, managing to knock him to the ground again. The Master Chief outwrestled him, got on top and knocked him out with two hard punches to the face.

"I was afraid Grunt would turn out to be unstable. I'm not sure anybody else would have been able to handle your little boy without seriously injuring him," Miranda said after watching the scuffle.. "He went out looking for a fight; did you see him hovering over the control panel in the elevator as if he was trying to make up his mind? I'm not sure who else he would have gone after but we're lucky that he went after the Master Chief."

"Absolutely," Shepard replied. "Grunt is probably going to wake up soon and the Master Chief said he wanted to "interrogate" him. I should go to make sure he doesn't torture him. If you don't have any pressing matters to attend to, you're welcome to join us," he offered.

"Only the paperwork you refuse to do yourself," Miranda said. "I'm considering just having EDI do it for us."

"Now that you mention it, why don't we have her do our paperwork?" Shepard asked.

"Because then I'd have nothing to do between missions," she said. Shepard did a double-take. That was sarcasm. Was Miranda Lawson developing a sense of humor? The idea was about as likely as the Council admitting he was right and taking preventative measures against the Reapers. She noticed the stunned look on his face and rolled her eyes.

"Shepard, I'm bringing Grunt into his room in the Port Cargo Area. He's starting to wake up," The Master Chief said on the radio. The two caught up to the Master Chief and took the elevator to the fourth deck. When they got to Grunt's room, the Master Chief hacked his Omni-tool to create a hard-light barrier binding his wrists behind his back. Grunt awoke shortly afterwards. At first he was confused and then he became angry again.

"Why did you attack me?" The Master Chief said.

Grunt deflated a bit when he saw Shepard watching, "I needed a challenge. I was going to rip something or someone apart. I don't know why but I couldn't control it. I knew it was wrong because I had promised Shepard that I would handle my problem."

"Why should I let you live?" the Master Chief asked.

"Master Chief, stand down!" Shepard demanded. The armored giant turned his head to look at the Commander. "Grunt is a part of my crew. I'll take responsibility for him and put him under restrictions for now," he finished.

The Master Chief nodded and undid the restraints before leaving. Shepard addressed Grunt, "I'm disappointed in you. Somebody could have gotten hurt and you could've gotten yourself killed."

"I know, Battle Master," Grunt said.

"Was this what you wanted to talk to me about earlier?" Shepard asked.

"Yes," Grunt hung his head in shame.

Shepard sighed, "I'm not sure what's wrong with you. Mordin said you were perfectly healthy yesterday. We're going to Tuchanka to see if somebody can help us out. In the meantime, I want you to stay in your room. I'll have chow delivered to you twice a day." Grunt nodded his head and Shepard immediately set off to find Mordin in case he was trying to kill somebody as well.

When Shepard made his way up to the lab, he saw Mordin working with more energy than usual. "Shepard," The Salarian scientist said, "Important news. Know you're busy. Have to deal with the Collectors. Planning attack. Too important to wait. Just received data, still processing, analyzing likely scenarios. Not sure how to begin. Too much intel. You remember our talk? My work on genophage modification?"

"You stopped the Krogan adaptation to the genophage," Shepard said, somewhat confused.

"Part of a team. Scientists, all different types. Blood Pack mercenaries captured former team member Maelon. Last seen on Tuchanka. Might torture him, make an example. Recovering Maelon would be a personal favor to me," Mordin said

"Do you think they found out your team updated the genophage?" Shepard asked. While he didn't like the genophage, he understood that it was the best temporary solution until the Krogan get themselves under control.

"Unclear. No way to determine it until we get to Tuchanka," Mordin replied.

"I'll make it a priority. We're already heading there to take care of whatever is going on with Grunt," Shepard assured him. When all of that was taken care of, he went to his private quarters to type an email.

"Hey, Ash, it's me. I'm sorry for how things went between us on Horizon too. Maybe you're right that we're not who we used to be but you've had two years to move on. I didn't and I haven't stopped thinking about you since I woke up on that Cerberus station. I wish you could join me. I have Garrus and Tali with me to keep me sane but Cerberus can never replace you all. I have a tough road ahead and the Alliance and Council won't help me but I'll do what I can. Please don't turn your back on me like everyone else.

-Johnathan Mattis Shepard

It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate

I am the captain of my soul."

Satisfied with it, Shepard took a nap.

The Master Chief had finished cleaning up the hangar bay when Miranda stepped off the elevator. He stood up and faced her, "Good afternoon, Ma'am."

"Miranda is fine, Master Chief. I wanted to see how you were doing after that scuffle," She said.

"I'm fine."

"Were you really going to kill him?" Miranda asked.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"He attacked me and had confessed to mental instability as well as a constant need to be violent," he said coldly.

"So it was nothing personal? That's good. Cerberus may put humanity first but we don't want to kill every alien there is. Too many join out of simple Xenophobia," Miranda said. The Master Chief nodded. "I'll let you have the deck to yourself," she said when it was obvious that she wouldn't get any more out of him.

"Ah, Tuchanka, nothing says home like rotting carcasses and nuclear radiation," Garrus said as he stepped off the shuttle.

"This is the Krogan homeworld? This chunk of rock is barely worth standing on. Never thought I'd miss the tank," Grunt said. Tali didn't say anything but she looked around nervously, as if the local germs would go through her suit and kill her. Come to think of it, they just might. Mordin was uncharacteristically silent as well. He was probably preoccupied with thoughts of his apprentice.

They were stopped by two Krogan on their way to see the local clan leader. "You!" one of them said to Shepard, "Our leader works with aliens but keep your pet on a leash. Either get him the rite or put him down."

"Do you know what's wrong with him?" Shepard asked, while reaching for a gun.

"Just talk to the clan leader," he responded.

The five of them made their way to the clan leader's chambers. It looked like a shithole the entire way but sitting on a throne, past two large Krogan, sat a familiar figure. Shepard bolted towards them, leaving the rest of the group to catch up. Garrus and Tali only managed to figure it out when they were stopped by two large Krogan.

"Halt. You must wait until the clan leader summons you. He is in talks," the Krogan said as he turned towards the leader of clan Urdnot.

Some other Krogan was arguing with Wrex, "You know what tradition demands. Clan Urdnot must respond. Your reforms will not go unopposed, you risk appearing weak at a critical time." Wrex was obviously bored with the smaller Krogan and looked around only to see his old friends standing there waiting for him.

"Shepard!" Wrex said, effectively dismissing the other Krogan.

"Good enough?" Shepard asked the Krogan bodyguard who stepped aside, "excuse me." The two friends walked towards each other.

"Shepard! My friend! You look well for dead, Shepard; I should've known the void couldn't hold you," he said. Finally, an old friend who was actually happy to see him

"It looks like you've done well for yourself," Shepard responded.

"Not just for me, Shepard, for all Krogan. Clan Urdnot is just the start. When I'm done, we will be one people again," Wrex said. He was a far cry from the disillusioned mercenary Shepard had first met two and a half years ago.

"You've abandoned many traditions to get your way, dangerous," the whiny Krogan said.

Wrex turned towards him and headbutt him, "Speak when spoken to, Uvenk. I'll drag your clan to glory whether it likes it or not." Shepard couldn't help but smirk at the Krogan. "Now, Shepard, what brings you here? How is the Normandy?" Wrex asked as he sat down on his rubble throne.

"Destroyed in a Collector surprise attack. I ended up spaced," Shepard said.

"Well you look good. Ah, the benefits of a redundant nervous system," Wrex replied.

"Yeah, humans don't have those."

"Oh it must've been painful then. But you're standing here. You've got a strong new ship. Brings me back to the old days, us against the unknown, killing it with big guns, good times."

"The best," Shepard agreed. "Sounds like you've got big changes ahead for the Krogan."

"We're making a neutral ground where all clans are welcome. Fertile females can be shared among clans. We will strengthen the race as a whole," Wrex said.

"You threaten everything that makes us strong. It will not last," Uvenk whined.

"Maybe. Until then you're lucky to be a part of it," Wrex told him.

"How do you maintain security with so many different clans in one place?" Shepard asked.

"Any clan willing to send in hostages can come in. No fighting inside the camp. Each clan punishes its own criminals. We stop conflicts before anyone dies. Then we present a simple choice. Pay a fine and deal with your problem, or your clan is no longer welcome."

"That doesn't sound very harsh by Krogan standards," Shepard said.

"Allies from other clans like what I'm doing. They help deal with skeptics. Many are eager for an outlet. Every time I've declared a clan unwelcome, my allies have destroyed them. Word gets around," Wrex told him.

"What did the women of clan Urdnot think of this plan?" Shepard asked.

"It was our female clan leader's idea. The neutral area is safe and it encourages more female clans to ally with us. Attacks on Urdnot now endanger the females of all clans. Even clans that want to see me dead will defend Clan Urdnot," Wrex told him.

"What's so important about maintaining individual clans?" Shepard asked.

"Every clan has different customs, Rites of passage, rules of behavior, battle songs; all unique That diversity makes us great. No clan, not even mine, was meant to survive on its own."

"I hope that works well for your people. But back to the reason I'm here: I have a Krogan on my crew, he has some kind of sickness and needs treatment," Shepard gestured to Grunt, who was almost as large as Wrex.

Wrex leaned forward to get a closer look at Grunt. "Where are you from, whelp? Was your clan destroyed before you could learn what is expected of you?" Wrex asked as Grunt walked forward.

"I have no clan, I was tank bred by Warlord Okeer. My line distilled from Kredak, Moro, Shiagur," Grunt said.

"You recite warlords but you are the offspring of a syringe," Uvenk said. Shepard was considering just shooting the overgrown frog so he would stop annoying him.

"I am pure Krogan!" Grunt exclaimed, "you should be in awe," he finished, unsure of himself."

"Okeer is a very old name, a very hated name," Wrex said.

"He's dead," Grunt responded.

"Of course. You're with Shepard, how could he be alive?" Wrex asked.

"I need Grunt back up to speed. What's wrong with him?" Shepard asked.

"There's nothing wrong with him, he's becoming a full adult," Wrex explained.

"Adolescence?" Garrus asked bewildered, "Can't we just take him to Omega and buy him a few dances."

"I don't care what you aliens call it," Wrex said, "Krogan undergo the Rite of Passage."

"Too far, Wrex," Uvenk said, "Your clan may rule but this thing is not Krogan."

"Idiot," Wrex said as Uvenk finally stormed off. "So, Grunt, do you wish to stand with clan Urdnot?"

"This is your choice," Shepard said when Grunt looked over to him.

"It is in my blood. It is what I am for."

"Good boy. Speak with the Shaman. He's over on the second level. Give him a good show and he'll set you on the path," Wrex told Grunt. "You too, Shepard. How many times have you stepped in a mess for your crew?"

"One more thing, Wrex, I'm looking for a Salarian. He was captured by the Blood Pack and brought here," Shepard said.

"My scout commander can direct you. He's probably near the perimeter running target practice," Wrex said.

"Thanks, Wrex."

"Shepard."

Shepard turned to Tali, "go back to the ship and get the Master Chief. Tell him to bring big guns for dangerous wildlife. You stay on the ship."

"But Shepard, I can fight!" Tali exclaimed defiantly.

"Yes you can and if we were going to face the Geth, there's nobody I'd rather have on my side but this is Tuchanka. A scratch will kill you painfully, especially with your immune system," he told her in a way that would allow for no argument. She backed down and headed back to the shuttle.

The Master Chief was cleaning one of his assault rifles when Tali came into the hangar to inform him of the Commander's request. Cortana had told him of the local fauna and he decided that he would probably be best served with the BR85HB with some grenades and a M90 CAWS. He raised Commander Shepard on the COM to verify the orders and get clarification.

"That's right, Master Chief. We're running a little bit short on time, Maelon could already be dead but if he isn't, any time spent is risking his life. But at the same time, I can't have Grunt attacking any of the crew. I don't want him or any of my crew at more risk than they need to be," Commander Shepard responded.

"Acknowledged, sir," The Master Chief replied, "Mission objectives?"

"Watch his back and let him take the lead but give him guidance," Shepard said.

"Affirmative," The Master Chief said as he stepped into the shuttle.

When he landed, he was met by Grunt who explained the situation to him and why he was needed. The Master Chief and Grunt followed Shepard's directions to the Shaman to find Uvenk being yelled at by the Shaman. "You go beyond yourself, Uvenk. The rites of Urdnot are dominant."

"How do we know that it would challenge him? He's unnatural. The beasts of the Rite could ignore him like a lump of plastic!"

"They know blood no matter the womb. Your barking does not help your case," The Shaman told him.

"I'll speak for myself!" Grunt said, interrupting their argument.

"This is the tank bred?" The Shaman walked up to Grunt and sniffed him, "It is very lifelike. It smells correct as well. Your protests ring hollow, Uvenk."

"I don't care what that idiot says," Grunt told the Shaman. "Urdnot Wrex gave me permission."

"There's the fire I like to see in a Krogan. Oh the shame this heaps on those who whine like pups," The Shaman said.

"If this must stand on ritual then I invoke a denial," Uvenk said, "My Krantt stands against him, he has no one."

"My patience is tested but Uvenk invokes correctly, Grunt. Who is your Krantt? Your allies willing to kill and die on your behalf," The Shaman said.

"Chief," Cortana said, "Think of a Krantt like Blue Team. You should volunteer yourself. Also, according to Krogan culture, a headbutt is seen as a gesture of dominance so you may want to headbutt Uvenk if he keeps this up."

"He has me. We'll kill anything in our way," The Master Chief said.

"Spoken well!" The Shaman said excitedly, "Most aliens and some Krogan do not understand our ways. I believe you do."

"Aliens don't know strength, my followers are true Krogan! Everything about Grunt is a lie," Uvenk said before he crumpled onto the floor under the force of the Master Chief's helmet hitting him on the nose. The Krogan got back on shaky feet and attempted to strike the large human, only to get kicked in the chest off of the railing behind him.

"This is Sparta!" Cortana said to him privately while giggling like a school girl.

"What?"

"Oh, never mind, you uncultured caveman," she teased.

"I like this human! He understands!" The Shaman said laughing as Uvenk struggled to get to his feet again before collapsing. The Shaman led the Spartan and Super Krogan into a large tank and drove to an arena.


	7. Chapter 06

"This is Tuchanka's most recent scar," The Shaman told them as they entered an arena. "The last surface city to fall in the rebellions, the keystone is at the heart. It has survived wars and the passage of centuries. It endures… like the Krogan. If you wish to join Clan Urdnot, you must contemplate the keystone and its trials." Grunt rolled his shoulders to loosen up a little and growled in anticipation. Nothing would keep him from becoming a true Krogan. The Master Chief was characteristically silent. Grunt didn't understand that about the overgrown human. Why would such a fierce warrior not revel in the glory of their battles? "Press the button when you are ready to begin," the Shaman told him as he left the arena. That drove all thoughts of humans and their strange ways from Grunt's mind.

Grunt got his Eviscerator ready and pressed the button on the console. "First the Krogan conquered Tuchanka," the Shaman's voice said over a loudspeaker, "and mastered a natural world only we are fit to hold." The two of them watched the keystone move up and slam into the ground. Grunt heard roars and growls coming from the tunnels and let out a psychotic laugh. A pack of Varren came running out of the tunnels and straight for the warriors. Grunt made a disgusted noise as he charged at them, ignoring the Master Chief's calls to stay back. The Master Chief had his way of killing things, Grunt had his own.

The Master Chief sighed and stood on a platform to shoot at the Varren who were focusing on the Krogan with his Battle Rifle. He kept it on semiautomatic to conserve ammo as he killed the few overgrown canines that got around Grunt in their attempts to surround and overwhelm the Krogan. Grunt was a whirlwind of teeth, fists, and anger that the Varren were powerless against. He grabbed the last one by the throat and devoured it.

The Master Chief was reminded of Brutes eating their enemies and subconsciously clenched his fists before reminding himself that Grunt was not a Jiralhanae. Grunt made his way back up the podium and pressed the button again. "Then the Krogan were lifted to the stars to destroy the fears of a galaxy, an enemy only we could chase to their lair," the Shaman said as the keystone raised higher and fell.

A dragon-like creature flew by and roared at the two, the Master Chief shot it a few times but the thick hide protected it as it flew off. The creature left behind several smaller creatures that vaguely resembled lobsters. "I believe they're called Klixen, Chief. DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THAT CONDESCENDING BITCH SAID TO ME AFTER OUR CHESS GAME?"

"Cortana!" the Master Chief yelled.

"Sorry! They shoot fire from their mouths and are resistant to fire themselves and have a thick exoskeleton," she said before retreating into herself again.

The Master Chief yelled at Grunt not to charge at them but the young Krogan refused to listen to him and was quickly engulfed in flames. The Master Chief sprinted towards him and knocked two of the Klixen out of the way before pulling Grunt to safety while firing at the Klixen one handed with his battle rifle. From what little he knew about Krogan biology, fire kept them from regenerating as effectively but Grunt would be okay given time. Time they didn't have so the Master Chief gave him some of that Medi-gel Grunt was carrying and watched as his tissue repaired itself faster than anything he'd ever seen before. In seconds, the Krogan was back on his feet and grabbed his shotgun off his back. Both super soldiers made short work of the overgrown bugs. Before Grunt went back up the stairs to press the button, the Master Chief stopped him.

"You need to listen to orders," he told the Krogan.

For a moment, Grunt considered attacking the human who dared try to command him but then he thought about it. The Master Chief and Shepard had been through countless battles before and were consistently trying to give him advice which he ignored and usually that got him into trouble. "You're right, I've been foolish," he responded. He could feel a small weight being lifted off of his shoulders. Maybe this is what it means to be a Krogan: not beating everything with brute force, but to be smart about it. The Master Chief nodded at Grunt and followed him up the stairs to press the button.

"Now all Krogan bear the genophage, our reward, our curse. It is a fight where the only goal is survival!" The Keystone rose even higher than before and came down with an earth-shaking thud.

"Do you feel that?" Grunt asked, "Everything is shaking. I'm ready." The ground kept vibrating until a giant worm-like creature came crashing out of the ground. "A Thresher Maw!" Grunt yelled in excitement. The thing was huge; it rivaled a Scarab in size but luckily lacked the mining cannon.

The Thresher Maw tilted its head back and spit something at the Master Chief. He quickly side stepped and watched as the spit dissolved the rock. So it was going to be like that. The Master Chief shot the body with his battle rifle, only to find that the hide was strong enough to deflect most of his bullets so he shot at the face and saw the worm flinch back. The explosive rounds must be working on it. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Grunt filling the air with bullets from his Revenant. The overgrown worm shot another splash of acid at them before retreating underground.

The Thresher Maw resurfaced on the other side of the arena and lobbed more acid at them. Again, they dodged and fired at the massive creature, peppering its face with bullets. The Master Chief launched a HEDP grenade, only for it to get hit by yet more acid as the Thresher Maw retreated underground again.

It resurfaced much closer to the Master Chief and Grunt this time and tried to bite the Spartan only to find its jaws closing on empty air and receive a HEDP grenade in its face. The creature roared in agony as the two of them hit it with automatic fire until it retreated beneath the surface yet again.

Again, Grunt and the Master Chief kept alert for any signs of the Thresher Maw resurfacing but only realized too late that it was coming right beneath them. The Master Chief dove to the side as the Thresher Maw grabbed Grunt by the leg and swallowed him whole. The Spartan hit him with yet another HEDP grenade to the face, causing it to shriek in agony. He was about to send another one down its throat, only for it to fall limp on the ground. The Master Chief was about to report that he had failed his mission when the Thresher Maw moved again, opening its mouth only to reveal a very slimy Grunt. "You survived," the Master Chief noted.

Grunt laughed heartily, "That had to be the best scrap I've ever had! When it swallowed me, I thought I was done for so I decided to make it pay and emptied my shotgun into its throat before I started cutting my way out with my Omni-blade." The Master Chief cracked a smile behind his helmet. A small ship flew past their heads and landed on the podium. "We have company," Grunt said, "good. I want more."

Uvenk stepped out of the ship, "you live, and you brought down the Thresher Maw. No one has done that in generations. Urdnot Wrex was the last."

"My Krantt gave me strength beyond my genes. Which are damned good," Grunt boasted. The Master Chief slowly started raising his rifle towards the group of hostile Krogan.

"This will cause discussion. I wonder… you say you are pure? No alien meddling in your construction? Just the Warlord Okeer?" Uvenk asked.

"I am designed to be the perfect Krogan!" Grunt boasted.

"Being designed is the problem. But not made by aliens. And he is truly powerful. That is a tolerable loophole," Uvenk said.

"A what?" Grunt asked incredulously.

"A reason to accept you. You are a mistake, but your potential could tip the current balance of the clans," Uvenk said smugly.

"You spit on my father's name! On Shepard's name! On the Master Chief and on myself! But now you stop ranting because I am strong?" Grunt asked furiously.

"With restrictions. You could not breed, of course. Or serve on an alien ship. But you'd be clan in name."

"I think you'll find my answer coming at muzzle velocity," Grunt told him. As soon as those words left his mouth, the Master Chief shot a grenade at one of the Krogan that Uvenk brought as backup. The Krogan in question found his shields and armor were gone, and that his head followed soon after with a three-round burst of the Master Chief's battle rifle. The Master Chief switched to his M90 CAWS and engaged the other Krogan while Grunt went Krogan to Krogan against Uvenk. Grunt stuck behind cover and fired at the arrogant Krogan with his Eviscerator who laughed at him, "Is this what the blood of the great warlords has come to? Cowering behind a rock? You disgrace the Krogan name, whelp!" He paused to reload his own shotgun only for a green and orange mass of fury to charge into him.

"I am Krogan!" Grunt yelled as he pounded at Uvenk's skull. "You are worthless! You spit on what it means to be a Krogan! People like you will be the death of our species!" Grunt didn't notice that the firing had stopped. Or that Uvenk's skull was a bloody pulp. He just kept striking until an armored hand was placed on his shoulder. He looked up to see the bronze visor looking at him emotionlessly.

* * *

Over a hundred miles away, Shepard, Garrus, and Mordin had just gotten off of the tank and stepped into a wasteland. Soon they were attacked by Klixen and made short work of the vermin. After rounding a corner, Shepard had to jump back to avoid taking a missile to the face like his friend Garrus. "Contacts!" he yelled at his team before taking another peak. They were Vorcha. Shepard used a biotic charge and killed them both with his shotgun. Up the ramp, more of the Krogan rip-offs were waiting for them and Shepard's team made their way through them. After taking the Vorcha, two Krogan charged at them. Shepard quickly back tracked while Garrus provided cover fire and Mordin tried to hit them with an Incinerate. When their shields were down, Shepard charged at them, making one of them take a step back before he took a swing at the man. Shepard ducked under the swing and fired his shotgun twice at him while Garrus and Mordin focused on the other one. Shepard had to keep diving out of the way as the Krogan continuously tried to get Shepard in his grasp or line up a shot. Finally, the Krogan entered a blood rage and tried to charge at Shepard, who used a biotic charge to get behind the Krogan and fired a full thermal clip of his SMG at the Krogan.

"All that dancing looks exhausting, Shepard," Garrus told him.

"Keeps me young," Shepard grinned. They kept moving until they were outside a rundown hospital. Shepard noticed an overturned truck and marked the location on his Omni-tool for the combustion manifold before they entered the hospital.

"Repurposed Krogan hospital. Sturdy. Built to withstand punishment," Mordin said.

"That's unfortunate," Garrus said, "Hospitals aren't fun to fight through."

"What is fun to fight through?" Shepard asked as he lead the way, SMG at the ready.

"Gardens, electronics shops, antique stores, but only if they're classy," Garrus answered.

They all grew silent as they saw a corpse on the floor. "That body. Human. Need to take a look," Mordin said, "Sores, tumors, ligatures showing restraint at wrists and ankles. Track marks for repeated injection sites. Test subject. Victim of experimentation," Mordin said while reading something off of his Omni-tool.

"I don't suppose there's a way to tell who this poor bastard was?" Shepard asked.

"No tattoos or ID. Maybe slave or prisoner. Maybe merc or pirate. Irrelevant now. Clearly part of Krogan tests to cure genophage. Humans useful as test subjects. Genetically diverse. Enables exploration of treatment modules," Mordin reasoned.

"Wouldn't something native to Tuchanka work better? Varren, maybe?" Shepard asked.

"Yes. Human experiments strictly high-level, concept testing. Native Tuchanka fauna likely used later, in development stages. Wise to delay use of Varren until necessary. Powerful bite," Mordin said.

"What can you tell about the experiments from looking at the body?" Shepard asked.

"Position of tumors suggests deliberate mutation of adrenal, pineal glands. Modifying hormone levels. Counterattack on glands hit by genophage. Clever," Mordin said.

"Do you think they're close to curing the genophage?" Shepard asked.

"Can't say. Need more data. Conceptually sound though. Genophage alters hormone levels. Could repair damage with hormonal counterattack," Mordin answered.

"How are humans more genetically diverse?" Shepard asked. As far as he knew, humans lacked genetic diversity compared to other species from Earth.

"More variable. Peaks and valleys, mutations, adaptations. Far beyond other life. Makes humans useful test subjects. Larger reactions to smaller stimuli," Mordin answered.

"I know we can look much different from each other, but Asari have a wide range of skin tones," Shepard countered, somewhat confused, somewhat horrified.

"No. Ignore superficial appearance. Down to genetic code," Mordin told him. "Biotic abilities, intelligence levels. Can look at random Asari, Krogan, make reasonable guess. Humans too variable to judge. Outliers in all species, of course. Geniuses, idiots. But human probability curve offers greater overall variety."

"Well now we've got two reasons to shut them down," Shepard said.

"Focus on Maelon," Mordin said, getting up, "too late to help the dead."

They went down a set of stairs and around a corner, coming into a large chamber with a Krogan standing on a railing. "I am the speaker for Clan Weyrloc, offworlders. You have shed our blood. By rights, you should be dead already. But Weyrloc Guld, the Chief of chiefs, has ordered that you be given the chance to flee and spread the message of our coming." This asshole talked too much.

"Krogan don't generally let people go," Shepard said, "What does Clan Weyrloc have planned?"

"If you walk away now, you can tell your children that you saw Clan Weyrloc before our Blood Pack conquered the stars! You think the Urdnot impressive? They are pitiful. Weyrloc Guld will destroy them! The Salarian will cure the genophage and Clan Weyrloc will spread across the galaxy in a sea of blood!" the clan spokesman said.

"Appears they've discovered Maelon's work. Unfortunate," Mordin whispered.

"It doesn't have to happen like this. I can understand wanting to cure the genophage…" Shepard began.

"No, human! You understand nothing! You have not seen the piles of children that never lived! The Krogan were wronged! We will make it right, and then we will have our revenge!" The spokesman replied angrily.

Shepard tried reasoning with him, "Half of the galaxy sees the Krogan as victims! If you start a war, you'll lose their support!"

"We have the Blood Pack and we have the Salarian! When our clan numbers in the millions, we will not need their support. When we cure the genophage, Weyrloc Guld will rule all Krogan! The Krogan Rebellions will become the Krogan Empire!" Tired of the conversation, Shepard pulled out his pistol and shot at a pipe near the Krogan's feet. "See? The human cannot hit a simple target!" The Krogan boasted before he noticed the leaking gas. Shepard shot again, sending him and his two buddies up in flames. Several Vorcha and a couple of Krogan came pouring in through the door behind the now dead spokesman, right into Shepard, Garrus, and Mordin's line of fire. It was almost sad to see how easily they threw their lives away.

They moved up to the catwalk and through the door. "The lab is likely through there. Can smell antiseptic, hint of dead flesh," Mordin said. They continued in silence until they found a terminal, "active console. May contain useful data. One moment. Genetic sequences. Hormone mutagens still steady. Protein chains, live tissue, cloned tissue. Very thorough. Standard treatment vectors. Avoiding scorched-earth immunosuppressants to alter hormone levels. Good. Hate to see that."

"Most people wouldn't be so casual about developing a sterility plague, Mordin," Shepard pointed out.

"Not developing. Modifying. Much more difficult. Working within confines of existing genophage. A hundred times the complexity. Errors unacceptable. Could cause total sterility, malignant tumors. Could even reduce effectiveness. Worse than doing nothing. Had to keep Krogan population stable. One in one thousand. Perfect target, optimal growth. Like gardening," Mordin explained.

"You're saying you were working just as hard to keep their population from falling?" Shepard asked.

"Yes! Could have eradicated Krogan. Not difficult. Increased mutation to degrade genetic structure further. Chose not to. Rachni extinction tragic. Didn't want to repeat. All life precious. Universe demands diversity," Mordin said.

"What was it like working on the genophage modification project?" Shepard asked.

Mordin took a deep breath, "Best years of my life. Wake up with ideas. Talk over breakfast. Experiment all morning. Statistical analysis in afternoon. Run new simulations during dinner, set data runs to cook overnight. Laughter. Ego. Argument. Passion. Galaxy's biggest problem, massive resources thrown at us. Got anything we wanted."

"Sounds like you were pretty important. How'd you go from that to running a clinic on Omega?" Shepard asked.

"Wanted to heal people. Good use of last decade. Something easy. No ethical concerns," he said sadly. "Understand rationale for modified genophage. Right choice. Still hard to sleep some nights."

Shepard knew all about that. He still had nightmares about Torfan. "Do you keep in touch with your old team members?" he asked.

"No. All changed with deployment. Made test drop on isolated Krogan clan. Hit rest of Tuchanka when results were positive. End of project. Separate ways. Watching it end, watching birth rates drop. Personal. Private. Not appropriate for team," Mordin said.

"If the Krogan banded together and formed a united government, would you welcome it?" Shepard asked.

"Yes! United Krogan saved galaxy, destroyed Rachni. Genophage not punishment. Simply alters fertility to correct for removal from hostile environment," Mordin said.

"Let's get moving," Shepard said. In another room, they found the body of a female Krogan.

"Dead Krogan. Female. Tumors indicate experimentation. No restraint marks. Volunteer. Sterile Weyrloc female willing to risk procedures. Hoped for cure. Pointless. Pointless waste of life," Mordin said, more to himself than to Shepard or Garrus.

"I didn't expect you to be upset over the sight of a dead Krogan," Shepard said.

"What? Why? Because of genophage work? Irrelevant. No, causative. Never experimented on live Krogan. Never killed with medicine. Her death not my work, only reaction to it. Goal was to stabilize population. Never wanted this. Can see it logically… but still unnecessary. Foolish waste of life. Hate to see it," he said.

"I didn't think you'd had much direct contact with things like this. Did you come to Tuchanka after dropping your plague?" Shepard asked.

"Yearly recon missions. Water, tissue samples. Ensure no mistakes. Superiors offered to carry it on. Refused. Need to see it in person. Need to look. Need to see. Accept it as necessary. See small picture. Remind mself why I run a clinic on Omega," Mordin said before turning back to the dead Krogan woman. "Rest, young mother. Find your gods. Find someplace better."

"I didn't expect spirituality from you, Mordin," Shepard said.

"Genophage modification project altered millions of lives. Then saw results. Ego, humility, juxtaposition. Frailty of life. Size of universe. Explored religions after work completed. Different races. No answers. Many questions," Mordin said.

"Guilty conscience, doctor?" Shepard asked sincerely.

"Modified genophage project great in scope. Scientifically brilliant. But ethically difficult. Krogan reaction visceral, tragic. Not guilty, but responsible. Trained as doctor. Genophage affects fertility. Doesn't kill. Still caused this. Hard to see big picture behind pile of corpses," Mordin admitted.

"How do you deal with the nightmares?" Shepard asked.

"Wheel of life. Popular Salarian concept. Similar to human Hinduism in focus on reincarnation. Appealing to see life as endless. Fix mistakes in next life. Learn, adapt, improve. Refuse to believe life ends here. Too wasteful. Have more to offer. Mistakes to fix. Cannot end here. Could do so much more," he answered.

"If you need to do this much soul searching to get over it, maybe the genophage was wrong," Shepard offered.

"Had to be done. Rachni Wars, Krogan Rebellions all pointed to Krogan aggression. So many simulations. Effects of Krogan population increase. All pointed to war. Extinction. Genophage or genocide. Save galaxy from Krogan. Save Krogan from galaxy."

"Why not cure the genophage instead? Give the Krogan hope so they can rejoice," Shepard countered.

"Assumes human reaction. Krogan stimulus response different. Harsh environment, take chance to fight, flee. Would have caused chaos on Tuchanka. Victor would have war economy, bloodthirsty army. Galactic expansion only logical outcome. More war. Genophage saved lives war would have ended."

"This decision was made on the evidence of simulation?" Shepard asked.

"Yes. Millions of data points. Years of arguments. Countless scenarios. All noted Krogan fragmentation as dangerous. No unified culture to support repopulation. Would have been war. Turians and humans destroying Krogan utterly. Genophage was better. Saved lives!" Mordin said.

* * *

"You've saved a lot of lives, Shepard," Lieutenant Commander Anderson told the young Gunnery Sergeant as he handed him a silver star. Normally, this would be done by somebody in his own chain of command but expedience dictated otherwise. In most fields, an eight year Gunny would be unheard of. In Special Operations, it was only slightly faster than average among those who stayed in long enough.

"Thank you, sir," Shepard answered. "Sir, permission to speak freely?"

"I'd say you've earned that, Gunnery Sergeant," Commander Anderson told him.

"Did I make the right call? I got my entire team and the platoon we were leading killed," Shepard wondered. This wasn't the first time he'd lost people. He'd lost a lot of good friends over the years. But this was the first time that so many people under his command got killed.

Anderson thought for a moment before answering, "Shepard, you're going to get a lot of hate for what you did here. A lot of good men and women died on your order. But a decision needed to be made and Major Kyle snapped under the pressure, leaving his unit without a leader after Captain Conway's death. I wasn't on the ground so I can't tell you whether I would've made the same decisions but you were there. You got the job done and sometimes that's all we can do. This isn't an old-school vid where doing the right thing means you win. Mission accomplishment comes first; survival second. What I can tell you is that a lot more people are going to be sleeping peacefully without worrying about slavers."

"Thank you, sir," Shepard responded.

"No problem, Gunnery Sergeant. Why don't you join the Navy when your enlistment period is up? A change of pace might do you some good."

* * *

"Shepard?" Garrus asked, concerned for his friend.

"Let's get going," Shepard said, snapping out of his memories. They left the Krogan woman's corpse behind and continued on until they found a slumped Krogan.

"You killed the Blood Pack Guards?" He asked.

"Not Blood Pack, not member of Clan Weyrloc. Wrong clan markings," Mordin said.

"I'm an Urdnot Scout. Weyrloc guards got me. Brought me here," the Krogan said.

"The Chief scout told us to watch for you. We've taken out the guards. Get back to Urdnot," Shepard told him.

"I can't. They Weyrloc did things to me. Drugs, injections, said I was sacrificing for the good of all Krogan. Experiments to cure the genophage. Everything's blurry. Hard to think. Have to stay," the scout said.

"Mordin, can you get him back on his feet? Stims maybe? Something to bolster his immune system?" Shepard asked.

"You don't understand. I'm not too sick to leave. I have to stay. They're curing the genophage. They're going to make it all better! They have to keep doing the tests," the scout said.

"Caution, Shepard. Patient unstable, susceptible. Brainwashed," Mordin whispered to him.

"Why do you want them to keep doing the tests?" Shepard asked.

"This is my fault. I got caught. Wasn't strong enough, not good enough. This is the best I can do. This is all I can do. I'm not big enough to have a real shot with the females. I'll never have kids of my own. But if I help undo the genophage, then I mattered!"

"Millions of children will be born—Weyrloc children. They're going to destroy the other clans," Shepard told the scout.

"But… no. No, they said I was helping Urdnot!"

"If you want to help Urdnot, you need to get back there. But it would take a real badass to make it back to camp while injured," Shepard said.

"I can do it!" the scout told him.

"You? I said a badass, not some scout whining like a Quarian with a tummy ache!" Shepard taunted.

"I can do it! I'm up! And I'm going to the female camp!" the scout declared.

"Damn right you are! Get back there and show them what you're worth! Go, go!" Shepard said. The Krogan roared as he charged past them back to Camp Urdnot.

"There's no pep talk like a military pep talk," Garrus remarked.

"Shepard, I'm detecting crates ahead that are holding unstable materials. A misplaced shot could cause a significant explosion," EDI informed him as they came upon a large room with several levels. Or a well placed shot.

Shepard told Garrus to set up a sniping position and charged at a group of Vorcha when Garrus opened fire. Garrus focused on the handful of Krogan in the room while Shepard focused on taking out the Vorcha and Mordin supported Garrus. Shepard's aggressive style worked well with Garrus' tactical approach which is why they often went on missions together. The problem was that sometimes he got reckless. Like when he found himself too close to an angry Krogan while said Krogan was hidden from Garrus' aim by a pillar. Shepard did the only thing he could do. He jumped off the railing. He used another biotic charge to get onto another catwalk. Now he was completely on his own until Garrus could get three levels down. He heard the staccato of an assault rifle and realized that Garrus and Mordin were probably trying to push downwards to help him out. How sweet of them.

Meanwhile, Shepard kept charging at enemies and finishing them off with shotgun blasts. He heard a Krogan coming down the stairs and knew it was time to keep moving. He just didn't have the firepower to take them down while surrounded by pawns. Shepard ran back up the stairs to find Garrus and Mordin taking on the last Krogan on that level so he hit him with a biotic charge and knocked him over the railing and down ten floors where he broke his neck. Garrus opened fire on the Krogan that chased Shepard up the stairs and they were left alone. They opened another door and saw a Salarian hunched over a terminal, busy at work.

"Maelon? Alive. Unharmed," Mordin said in disbelief, "No signs of restraint. No evidence of torture. Don't understand."

"For such a smart man, Professor, you always had trouble seeing evidence that disagreed with your preconceptions. How long will it take you to admit that I'm here because I wish to be here?" Maelon said.

"Maybe the Weyrloc brainwashed or drugged him to keep him under control," Shepard suggested.

"Unlikely. Pupils normal. Body language consistent with standard metabolic state," Mordin said.

"Please, Professor. You wrote a paper on this. Forced behavior modification always results in mental degradation," Maelon said. That explained what Saren said a few years ago. "Whether from Reaper indoctrination or drugs, test subjects always lose higher cognitive function."

"Hold on, did you say Reaper?" Shepard asked. "So is the Salarian government taking the Reaper threat seriously?"

"Captain Kirrahe was with you on Virmire, Shepard. Of course, we're taking this threat seriously," Mordin answered.

"But Anderson can't seem to find any support on the Council," Shepard said.

"If Councilor Valern were to come out in open support of you, he would lose support of Councilors Sparatus and Tevos in other matters crucial to the Salarians," Mordin explained.

"I hate politics," Shepard said. "He was never kidnapped. He came here voluntarily to cure the genophage." Maelon nodded in agreement.

"Impossible. Whole team agreed! Project necessary!" Mordin exclaimed.

"How was I supposed to disagree with the great Doctor Solus? I was your student! I looked up to you!"

"Experiments performed here. Live subjects! Prisoners! Torture and executions. Your doing?" Mordin asked in disbelief.

"We've already got the blood of millions on our hands, Doctor. If it takes a bit more to put things right, I can deal with that," Maelon replied.

"Do you honestly think that the experiments you did here are justified?" Shepard asked.

"We committed cultural genocide! Nothing I do will ever be justified! The experiments are monstrous… because I was taught to be a monster," Maelon said.

"Mordin, did you ever perform experiments like this?" Shepard asked.

"No. Never taught you this, Maelon," Mordin said.

"So your hands are clean! What does it matter if the ground is stained with the blood of millions?" Maelon asked. "You taught me that the end justified the means. I will undo what we did, Professor. The only way I know how."

"What happens if the genophage is cured and the Krogan expand again?" Shepard asked, "That will be on your head."

"We justified this atrocity by saying the Krogan would cause havoc and war if their population recovered. But look at the galaxy! Batarian attacks in the Traverse, Geth attack on the Citadel. Is this a more peaceful universe?" Maelon asked. "The assault on your Eden Prime might never have happened if we had let the Krogan recover. We'll never know."

"How would a Krogan population explosion have done anything to stop Saren and the Geth?" Shepard demanded.

"An increased Krogan population would have forced the Council to take steps, likely involving colony rights in the Traverse. The Turian fleets would be vigilant for any military activity in the area. They might have stopped the Geth at Eden Prime."

Shepard exploded with fury, "It took the combined power of the Alliance fifth fleet and the Citadel fleet to bring down Sovereign! The Turians lost twenty cruisers, each with a crew of about three hundred. The Alliance lost eight cruisers. You're out of your god damned mind if you think a Turian patrol fleet would have been anything more than a speed bump for Eden Prime!" Shepard took a deep breath to calm down, "You talked about killing but the genophage isn't lethal. It only affects fertility rates."

"Krogan fight over fertile females. They become mercenaries or pirates because they see no alternative! They would be thriving in a cultural renaissance now had we not decided that this is what they deserved!" Maelon shouted.

"Inaccurate. Krogan population resulted in war. Simulations were clear!" Mordin said.

"Why work with Clan Weyrloc? And how did you access the genophage data?" Shepard asked.

"The data was easy to obtain. We all still had clearance. We were heroes. All I had to do was ask," Maelon said, "as for the Weyrloc, they were the only clan with both the resources and the commitment."

"Urdnot has a larger camp than Weyrloc. Why not use them?" Shepard asked. Though he was glad Wrex hadn't gotten involved in this mess.

"Urdnot Wrex is too soft. He wasn't willing to do the experiments I needed. It's Urdnot's loss and Weyrloc's gain. Their clan will be the first to recover from the crime we committed," Maelon told him.

"Maelon clearly doesn't need rescuing," Shepard said to Mordin, "What do you want to do?"

"Have to end this," Mordin said.

"You can't face the truth, can you?" Maelon asked, raising his pistol and alternated aiming at Shepard and Mordin. "Can't admit that your brilliant mind led you to commit this atrocity!" Mordin punched him in the face.

"Unacceptable experiments. Unacceptable goals. Won't change. No choice. Have to kill you," Mordin said.

"Wait! You don't need to do this, Mordin. You're not a murderer," Shepard said.

"No. Not a murderer. Thank you, Shepard. Finished, Maelon. Get out. No Weyrloc left. Project over," Mordin said.

"What if he talks to more Krogan and tells the public about the modified genophage project?" Shepard asked.

"Special Tasks Group good at covering tracks. No proof," Mordin declared, "Weyrloc willingness to work with Salarian unusual. Other Krogan will kill him."

"Aren't you worried that he'll start his research again?" Shepard asked.

"No. Locking this unit. Special Tasks Group can cut access to old data. Cold start from scratch. Decades of work, though. Didn't teach you everything I knew," Mordin told Maelon.

"You heard the professor. Get out before he changes his mind," Shepard told Maelon.

"Where am I supposed to go, Professor?" Maelon pleaded.

"Don't care. Try Omega. Can always use another clinic," Mordin said.

"The Krogan didn't deserve what we did to them, Professor. The genophage needs to end!" Maelon said as he left.

"Not like this," Mordin whispered to himself. "Apologies, Commander. Misunderstood mission parameters. No kidnapping. My mistake. Thank you."

"Don't worry about me, Mordin. How are you doing?" Shepard asked.

"Should have killed him. Wanted to. Easier than listening. Easier for him too. Experiments indicate how far he's fallen. Expected it from Krogan. Not one of mine," Mordin said.

"Something to think about the next time you're discussing the ethics of the genophage," Shepard said.

"Yes. So many variables. Stress responses. Impossible to truly predict. Something to think about," Mordin said.

"Maelon's research. Only loose end. Could destroy it. Closure, security. Sill valuable though," Mordin said.

"This is the research that included tests on living victims. It's tainted," Shepard said.

"Right now, victims died for nothing. Keep it, use it, death worth something. Maelon's work could cure genophage. Don't know. Effects on Krogan. Effects on galaxy. Too many variables. Too many variables!"

"Keep it," Shepard said, "At worst, it'll sit in some STG server somewhere forever. At best, maybe it can be used to cure the Krogan someday," Shepard said.

"Point taken, Shepard. Capturing data, wiping local copy," Mordin said. "Still years away from cure. But closer than starting from scratch. Done. Ready to go. Ready to be off Tuchanka. Anywhere else. Maybe somewhere sunny."

* * *

"I've got to say, that was some impressive work, whelp," Wrex said to Grunt somewhat affectionately. "Not many have been swallowed by a Thresher Maw and lived to tell about it."

"My Krantt gave me strength," Grunt declared.

"That he did but when you were swallowed and thought you were done, you kept fighting. That's the kind of spirit we need in Clan Urdnot," Wrex told him.

"Thank you, Warlord Wrex," Grunt said humbly.

"Come with me," Wrex said and lead him to the Armory of Urdnot. "This is my ancestral armor. It's crap now but it meant a lot to my family at one point. It was taken from my grandfather after the Rebellions by a Turian. It took me years to find it but only Shepard and another Turian were there to help me get it back. That's why Urdnot is willing to work with aliens while advancing the Krogan as a whole. We can accomplish a lot more by working together. I'm sure Shepard could find an even more feminine way to say it." Wrex handed Grunt a shotgun., "This is a M-300 Claymore, the most powerful shotgun in the galaxy. It only has one shot per thermal clip but it will destroy anything it hits. I want you to have it."

"I don't know what to say," Grunt said awed.

"Don't say anything. Use it to kill those damned Collectors," Wrex laughed.

"Yes, sir" Grunt said.

"You may also want to do some reading. We have plenty of strong Krogan in our clan but not enough smart ones," Wrex said.

* * *

Author's Note: Please read and review so I can make this story better.


	8. Interlude

Author's Note: Sorry I've taken so long to update. USMC keeps you busy. This chapter is a little different and it's based on a real battle that took place in Vietnam during October 5, 1968. Apparently I didn't proofread well enough the first time so I went back and fixed most of the mistakes.

* * *

During the October of 2551, the Covenant had inflicted severe losses on ODST recon teams running missions on Shau VII in the western portion of the continent, Sog. The Covenant was believed to have established a powerful base somewhere in that region while they repaired their crippled assault carrier. Desperate to prevent that from happening, local UNSC forces have deployed in force to hunt and kill every alien they can find.

Earlier that year, the Covenant had inflicted severe losses on UNSC personnel in the region and west of it in Lao valley. That valley was a key location where enemy troops and supplies were funneled down the notorious Remington Trail into Weatherby. Earlier in the war, three ODST Alpha Camps were overrun by Covenant troops. By the fall of 2551, Covenant gunners were bringing in more anti-aircraft weaponry and special, highly trained sapper units were created to hunt down and kill ODST Recon teams.

As the weather cleared over the Lao Valley on October 3, the brass assigned Recon team Strike Team (ST) Arizona to run a target just southwest of the Lao Valley. Lance Corporal James M Black, a combat-hardened veteran had been an ODST for over a year with the 104th ODST Brigade, was introduced to a new team leader. The Sergeant was appointed team leader only because he had more rank than Black, who had more experience fighting the Covenant—especially in this region—than the sergeant did. After the fireteam was introduced to the new fireteam leader, they were ordered to fly a visual reconnaissance (VR) over the target.

VRs were flown as close to the launch date as possible and usually in a UH-144 Falcon. In this case, the VR was flown two days before the target launch date of October 5, 2551. Black and the new sergeant flew in the rear of the aircraft. The primary and secondary landing zones had been selected when the aircraft was hit by anti-aircraft plasma fire. A piece of the undercarriage vaporized under the immense heat of repeated strikes and sent a metal fragment into the co-pilot's skull with such force that his helmet slammed against the ceiling and ricocheted into Black's lap—still containing part of the co-pilot's bloody head.

The pilot slammed the small aircraft down to treetop level and returned to South Sog. Black, unable to move or open a window, puked into the helmet. That night, there was a fair share of jokes in camp about Black's "puke and brain" salad.

Saturday October 5, there was no laughing as the Falcons flew west across Weatherby from Grendel, near the Beowulf Sea, over the Lao Valley into the target area. The weather was clear in Grendel, but cloudy over the area of operations (AO). During that flight, Black remembered how the launch commander had said this mission would be a cakewalk. Staff Sgt. Robert J Parks and Staff Sgt Patrick Watkins, the Forward Air Observers, nicknamed Covey, however, knew that it was a tough target where the Covenant had previously run out Forward Operating Base (FOB) 1 teams. Additionally, there were no new landing zones for the team insertion. For this target, Watkins was the forward air controller in the Air Force AV-49 Wasp Close Air-Support ship, piloted by Captain Hartness.

ST Arizona's insertion started smoothly, as the first Falcon landed quickly with the fireteam leader and assistant team leader, Corporal Mosk, quickly exited the aircraft. As Black's Falcon spiraled downward toward the landing-zone (LZ), he observed a Covenant Flag planted atop a nearby knoll. From his days in the 104th brigade, Black knew that the presence of a Covenant flag meant that there was at least a regiment of Covenant troops in the area. The knoll was surrounded by jungle. On the west side there was a 1000-foot drop to the valley floor below.

The numbers didn't compute for Black. Approximately 3000 Covenant troops against nine ODSTs? Several plasma rifles opened fire before the Falcon's wheels touched down. Nonetheless, Black and the remaining ODSTs exited the UH-144. As the Falcon lifted off, the Covenant gunfire increased significantly and moments later, the laboring UH-144 Falcon crashed.

Although this was Black's second operation in the area, he knew the odds were stacked against ST Arizona. He and the gunner, Cowboy, argued vigorously for an immediate extraction. The team had been compromised and the element of surprise was gone.

"No!" said the new fireteam leader. "I'm an ODST. No split-lipped SOB is going to run me off!" Watkins offered him a chance to extract. The offer was declined. The team was to continue.

The team leader then ordered the point man to walk down a well-traveled trail away from the LZ and into the jungle. Black, Cowboy, and Biker, the gunner, argued against heading down the trail. The first rule of SOF recon was to never use trails, especially well-traveled ones.

The sergeant pulled rank and ordered the team to move down the trail, with Biker leading the way and the elder ODST following a short distance behind him. The trail wound into the jungle, and curved to the left. ST Arizona moved cautiously. As the team went down the trail, it moved parallel to a small rise on its right that was about 10 to 20 feet above the team. On it, an Elite Field Master had quickly assembled a force of 50 Covenant troops, who set up a classic L-shaped ambush.

The quiet of the early morning jungle was shattered when the Covenant troops opened fire with their plasma rifles, carbines, and pistols.

The plasma rounds ripped into the point man's chest and face. The fatal impact of those rounds seemed to keep his body suspended in air even as his flesh was vaporizing. What had been a human body seconds earlier was being chewed into an amorphous form of carbon. Three rounds slammed into the sergeant's head, melting the right side of his face, killing him instantly. Corporal Mosk, a gutless son of a general, buried his face in the dirt and started praying.

Black and the remaining ST Arizona team members opened fire. The ODST stood there, firing on single shot, picking off Grunts and Jackals on top of the rise and keeping an eye out for the Elite in charge. He reloaded his MA5K and went down the line, shooting them one after another. Sometimes they spun and he shot them a second or third time. Move fast, keep your head down, take cover and make every shot count: basics he'd learned from recruit training two years ago. It's funny how when the shit hits the fan, all you remember is the basics.

As the Covenant continued to fire on the team, Black and Cowboy formed the team into a circle and directed a barrage of grenades and 7.62mm fire into the surrounding jungle. Then startling, eerie silence hung over the men. Black thought he was in his grave. ST Arizona was in a low spot with the ground rising 10 to 20 feet on both the left and right. A perfect kill zone if he'd ever seen one.

Both the Covenant and ST Arizona tended to their wounded while the living combatants slammed loaded magazines or power cells into hot weapons. There was moaning and groaning, suffering on both sides. Black got on the COM to tell the Covey about ST Arizona's tragic turn of events. Black and Ryder scavenged weapons and ammo from the dead ST Arizona team members.

Covey responded, "you're not a doctor, nor for that fact, a medic. You can't determine who's dead or alive! Bring out all bodies for verification of death."

Their argument was drowned out when more than 100 covenant troops opened fire on ST Arizona, as enemy troops had reinforced the initial ambush unit. By now, the Covenant ranks were two rows deep. The front row fired plasma and the second row threw plasma grenades or fired Fuel Rod Cannons. The ground all around them turned to glass. It was a miracle they were still alive.

Another ODST was wounded. The tem had to get out of the hole or die in it. The Covenant taunted the humans in their harsh languages. The coward continued to pray. Black couldn't believe it. "This is no time to pray… do unto others before they do unto you!" he yelled. Whether or not the Covenant were praying, they continued to move around ST Arizona, some climbing into the trees. Cowboy and Black crawled 15 feet toward them, close enough so that Cowboy heard the Elite Field Master tell his troops to prepare to charge ST Arizona's position. The Field Master also told his troops on the long side of the "L" ambush not to fire. Black quickly rigged a C-12 claymore in the direction of the impending charge.

Several sword-wielding Elites charged. Black detonated the claymore, blowing a huge hole in their ranks. Before the smoke cleared, ST Arizona ran through the carnage, firing MA5s on full automatic and throwing frag grenades while dragging their three wounded team members out. Miraculously, ST Arizona made it through the wave of Covenant attackers and moved back toward the LZ, leaving their dead behind.

Covey had bad news for black: the Falcons had to return to base to refuel. No extraction was possible for at least two to three hours. Meanwhile, the relentless and bloodied Covenant ran after the strike team. Black planted a claymore mine with a five-second time-delay fuse. It wreaked havoc on the hard-charging Covenant.

As the smoke cleared and the body parts settled back to Earth, ST Arizona split in half and again charged through the battered and torn ranks of the Covenant warriors, killing any standing enemy. They counted at least 50 dead Covenant.

Again, eerie silence engulfed the team and ST Arizona regrouped. Just as suddenly, a new wave of Covenant soldiers rushed the beleaguered team. ST Arizona had been pushed near the cliff. It was a thousand feet to the ground if they went over the edge. Now on line, ST Arizona charged through the weakest Covenant flank, the one without any Elites, killing more enemy soldiers.

As he moved out, something landed a few feet behind Black, the plasma grenade exploded and knocked him into a tree, face first He thought he was drowning, but then he felt feet kicking him and hands slapping him all over. It was the team. They were beating Black back into consciousness and pouring water on his face. He tried to get up, but his legs didn't work. From the knees down, there was no armor or fatigues, only surface bleeding. One of the guys started smearing Bio-foam on his open wounds.

By 0900, word of ST Arizona's precarious position had spread through FOB 1 like wildfire. Requests were made for extra assets. It was now an official Prairie Fire emergency. All aircraft were pulled from their missions and sorties to support ST Arizona. Any gunships attached to the ODSTS were summoned to their aid.

The first gunships to arrive were the AV-22 Sparrowhawks. With them was a D77-TC Pelican with a ladder attached for jungle extractions. When the Sparrowhawks entered the AO, it was hammered by heavy enemy ground fire, as was the Pelican. Green plasma was seen going toward the Pelican. The ground fire became too intense and the drop ship had to withdraw and make an emergency landing at Camp Sparrow in the 77th Airborne Division Compound. Despite the hits, the Sparrowhawks made several passes, expending all ordnance, before returning to base to reload.

Wasp officers regrouped and prepared to fly back to Lao Valley to extract what was left of ST Arizona. The Base Commander asked for volunteers for a Bright Light mission and every recon man in FOB 1 volunteered. ST Nevada was scheduled to insert into the Prairie Fire AO the next day, October 6, because the team was ready to go, there was some initial discussion about Nevada being the Bright Light Team. As the day dragged on, however, and the perilous nature of ST Arizona's situation worsened, the Bright Light option faded because the original LZ was now too deadly for any aircraft to attempt an extraction.

When Watkins returned to FOB1, for the Falcon to refuel, he told the others that it didn't look good. He wasn't sure if they'd be able to get them out. He explained the low, sunken area in the LZ, the spotty weather, and how the smoke from expended ordnance hung over the LZ, making it more difficult to spot the team and to deliver air strikes accurately.

A resupply of ammo, grenades, claymore mines, M319 grenades, water, and first aid supplies was placed on a Pelican and launched toward ST Arizona. In Weatherby, Cowboy worked on Black's legs. He told Black the last wave of COVENANT had continued onto the LZ. Cowboy and Black heard more Marine Pelican and Sparrowhawk gunships arrive overhead and witnessed the Covenant on the LZ open fire, hammering the lead aircraft.

Again, Corporal Mosk panicked, cried, and shouted skyward. The survivors told Black that they were going to kill him if he didn't shut up. Black agreed. "I'll pull the trigger on him myself."

"God forgive you!" Corporal Mosk responded tearfully.

"You and your God have no place here!" Black retorted. Cowboy grabbed a startled Black by the throat and lifted a Catholic crucifix from his neck and shoved it to his lips.

"It's the gods who have allowed us to get this far, Black!" he whispered tersely through clenched teeth.

The sound of approaching Sparrowhawks and Pelicans ended the religious debate as the realities of surviving a Covenant hell became center focus. The able-bodied picked up the wounded and moved toward the LZ. Spider, the forward air controller at the time, told Black that the first Pelican was en route to the LZ, but they planned to work the area surrounding ST Arizona with tactical air support first. In this case, a Short Sword bomber told Black to "key your headset for 10 seconds. Put your heads in the dirt, over."

Black acknowledged the radio transmission and told his teammates to put their heads down. As he looked into the sun, he observed the slowest-moving Short Sword he had ever seen. The glide path ratio was critical. Seconds later, he saw the tree line across the LZ explode into sheets of white, yellow, and orange flames, setting the jungle on fire with napalm. The craft banked sharply, appearing to stand its wing tip on the ground. The pilot cranked on the burners, dropped into the valley below, and then began a vertical climb.

Covenant small arms opened up on all sides of the valley. The Short Sword took numerous hits on its armor-plated underbelly. Among those shooting at the fast mover were several Covenant troops about 20 feet from ST Arizona's perimeter. As the napalm torched the jungle, dozens of Covenant soldiers scurried into the open field to escape the instant inferno that had engulfed their comrades.

As a second jet rolled in for a gun run, the Covenant initiated what the UNSC had termed, "getting close to the belt." In this case, the Covenant moved toward or outright charged ST Arizona to get as close to the team members as possible to avoid being hammered or burned by UNSC ordnance.

Firing on single shot, ST Arizona picked off each of them as they came out of the burning jungle. The Short Swords returned and made a run along the team's perimeter. Before the dust settled, Ryder and Cowboy crawled out and recovered several plasma weapons from the dead Covenant soldiers as they were running dangerously low on ammo.

Two of the nine G79H-TC Pelicans came chugging up the valley towards ST Arizona. Black popped a green smoke marker. The Covenant popped an identical smoke marker, confusing the pilots with devastating results.

The first Pelican followed the Covenant's smoke marker, and took a direct hit from a fuel rod cannon, which toppled it on its side, smashing its wing into the ground. The approaching ST Arizona team members narrowly missed getting hit with shrapnel from the crash.

Black, Cowboy, and another team member charged the fuel rod position, killing three Grunts before a hail of plasma fire drove them back to the team perimeter. The second Pelican hit an outcropping of rock on the western side of the knoll after taking heavy enemy fire. It exploded and fell 1000 feet to the valley floor below, taking with it ST Arizona's resupply.

"Nice going, Blackjack!" the Forward Observer barked.

"Fuck you, Covey," he replied.

Cowboy told Corporal Mosk to pray for everyone except Black because he was on the "devil's side." Black broke into laughter as he assessed ST Arizona's predicament: Ammo was desperately low, bodies were charred, the Short Swords had expended their ordnance, and Covey was belligerent. His nerves were shot. Training and man's basic survival instinct had completely taken over. Then, Covenant battle drums sounded.

Waves of Covenant troops with plasma pistols, mixed with sword-wielding Elites advanced on ST Arizona. When they were 15 feet away, ST Arizona opened fire. The semiautomatic plasma pistols were no match for the fully automatic firepower of the strike team. After the first burst of full-automatic fire, the team went to single shot. It was another turkey shoot. Without a word, look, or a plan, acting solely on instinct, all of them, except the cowardly assistant team leader, scurried forward and dragged back dead Covenant soldiers, placing the bodies in a circle around them and stacking them high. The deadly skirmishing continued for several hours before Covey told Black that more Pelican gunships and five Vulture heavy gunships were en route.

"Blackjack, Covey. What you're up against is the regiment you were sent to find, over."

"Is that all, only 3000 of the bastards? Well, I think we made a dent in them. Who's winning?"

"They are," Covey responded. As Black finished his comment, he saw a sight he would never forget. The Covenant formed a front line of Grunts and Jackals firing their plasma pistols and rifles. Behind them were several Elites swinging energy swords and brandishing carbines. Several grunts lined up and sent a volley of plasma grenades at the defending ODST team. They ducked behind their cadaver wall and threw some grenades of their own. The Covenant advanced. Grenade shrapnel severed the antenna on the portable radio Black carried. He quickly rigged an impromptu antenna from the wire. The relentless Covenant continued to advance, inch by bloody inch, hoping to drown the ODSTs in a sea of Grunt and Jackal blood.

Cowboy took two team members over the perimeter, seeking yet another line of fire to direct at the advancing Covenant. The advance continued despite firing from Black and his remaining team members. The Covenant was now merely feet away from the team's perimeter. At the last minute, with the Covenant a few body lengths away from the perimeter, two Pelican gunships arrived. The pilots were code named "The Judge" and "The Executioner." They roared into the battle, first with a Minigun blast followed seconds later with several rockets placed in the Covenant ranks. Arizona was saved, if only for a little while. The Covenant backed off for a few moments, briefly licking their collective wounds, although they were far from whipped. New assault lines of Covenant troops formed.

Before the Covenant opened fire on ST Arizona, however, the Executioner confronted the Covenant head on. With both heavy machineguns blazing away as the Pelican hovered inches off of the ground, between the team and the front of the Covenant, and skipped several 90mm rockets into the ground and into the Covenant ranks. Before the bleeding, startled Covenant could respond, the pilot lifted the gunship over the tree line and ducked down into the canyon, regaining enough air speed to return for another pass at the ST Arizona perimeter.

Before ST Arizona could celebrate, the Covenant charged again. Three more Covenant corpses were added to the cadaver wall. Silence dominated the battlefield. No bird chirps, no speaking, no noise of any type. Even the aircraft over the scene had flown far enough away that their absence amplified the empty air. Corporal Mosk, who hadn't fired a single shot, continued to pray.

Black patched up a burnt Cowboy. He gave him some painkillers before treating a third-degree burn on his right side from a carbine. "Where's the Master Chief when you need him?" Cowboy asked. The others laughed. Their laughter was interrupted when a Jackal sniper hit Chan in the crotch, hitting an artery.

As Ryder applied direct pressure to Chan's wound, several Wasps lumbered into the AO. The aircraft was so close to the team that Black could hear the distinctive, metallic click-click of the napalm canisters being released from the aircraft. The Wasps appeared to be falling, but actually they slipped down into the valley to escape Covenant gunfire as the Pelicans had done earlier that day.

Then, three plasma mortars opened fire. Black knew there was no way in hell any of the team could survive a Wraith's main weapon. He and Ryder crawled over the cadaver wall toward the mortars, cautiously picking their way through the charred Covenant bodies and carnage from the previous airborne assaults. They moved into the jungle, within 20 feet of the first Wraith. They would ambush the Grunts with the fuel rod launchers, he would hit the first Wraith, Ryder would hit the third, and they would combine fire on the second.

Black fired the fuel rod launcher at the weak point on the back of the Wraith and fired on the crew guarding it as the Wraith burst into flames. Ryder opened fire on his target at the same time that Black did. The survivors of Wraith-1 began chasing Black. In the confusion, the Covenant opened fire on each other as Black headed toward the second Wraith—with Covenant soldiers still chasing him—where Ryder was pinned down. Black threw a hand grenade and killed at least three Jackals with a blast of gunfire to free Ryder. They turned on the Covenant chasing Black and dealt with them. Then he and Ryder wiped out the Covenant at the second Wraith before they quickly returned to the team, all the while picking up ammo and weapons from dead or wounded Covenant troops.

By now, Watkins had returned to flying Covey rider above ST Arizona. Command had called in the Pararescue group to attempt a rescue of ST Arizona. Pararescue troopers flew modified Vulcan heavy gunships with extra armament and firepower. The first Vulcan started its descent to the LZ from 4000 feet. As it approached, the crew was looking for an orange panel on the southeast side of the LZ. However, as the aircraft was about to touch down, crew members noticed a second panel. The Covenant had an identical panel. The momentary pause was nearly fatal for them, as the Covenant opened fire on it from several sides. The heavy gunfire severed the main fuel line, causing a massive fuel leak inside the Vulcan.

The first Vulcan had to withdraw from the LZ. In a matter of seconds, there were two to three inches of aviation fuel on the aircraft's cabin floor. The fumes temporarily blinded the crew members but the pilot was able to stabilize the rugged Vulcan and returned to FOB 2, escorted by SPAD 11.

As Vulcan 2 hovered a safe distance away from the LZ, Watkins directed a few more air strikes around ST Arizona, with the hope that the Covenant soldiers would put their heads down long enough to get the team out. After a few air strikes, Vulcan 2, piloted by Air Force Major Vernon Granier, was called to attempt the extraction. For Granier, this was his first assignment in the Prairie Fire AO as a PJ Vulcan pilot.

When the call from Covey came, Granier knew that there were two ODSTs on the ground and that the majority of the team was wounded. He didn't hesitate. Granier piloted the PJ Vulcan toward the LZ. Unlike Vulcan 1, Granier knew which side of the LZ ST Arizona was on. As he approached the LZ, Covenant gunfire again reached a deafening roar, despite ST Arizona directing firepower at the Covenant.

As Granier began to hover over the LZ, Vulcan 2 was hammered by enemy gunfire. His crew chief reported that one Covenant plasma round had torn a six-inch hole through the floor. The round apparently slammed into one of the engines. Both engine-warning lights went on. Both engines were on fire.

Granier did a 180-degree turn and moved the damaged aircraft away from the deadly enemy fire, away from the team, struggling to keep it airborne, calling upon all of the training he had received to continue flying. Both crew members continued firing their machine guns as Granier battled to keep the ship in the air.

Time ran out for Vulcan 2. After traveling several hundred yards, Granier warned his crew to brace themselves for a crash landing. Both crew members continued firing their weapons until the burning PJ Vulcan slammed into the jungle.

ST Arizona was stunned. Covey and all of the men flying over the target area viewed the horror in grim silence. The men back at FOB 1 monitored the radio transmissions on their radios as Covey talked to Black. Strike Team Arizona's radio signal was too weak to hear any response. The word spread through camp about the latest horrific turn of events surrounding ST Arizona. The usual hustle/bustle of a Saturday at FOB 1 was replaced by quiet, hushed tones as the entire compound feared the worst, but continued to pray for the men of ST Arizona. Word of a proposed Arc Light mission reinforced the gravity of ST Arizona's situation. An Arc Light was a strike by a Broadsword bomber from more than 25000 feet.

Back in Weatherby, the stunned members of ST Arizona returned to their cadaver perimeter once again, nearly out of ammo. Corporal Mosk was face down, muttering, "The Lord is my shepherd…" One of the team went about collecting Plasma weapons from the Covenant as Spider and Watkins directed more air strikes around the team.

Within 10 to 15 minutes after Granier's PJ Vulcan crashed into the jungle, Covey learned that there were two survivors from the PJ Vulcan and asked ST Arizona if they could locate the remaining crew members. Granier had broken his back, but somehow had pulled himself from the burning PJ Vulcan. The other survivor, Sergeant Earnest Dean, had been thrown clear of the crash. Neither knew the location of the other. Watkins told Black where the Air Force survivors were and that they'd run a daisy chain between his position and the men, hopefully to clear the area enough for the team to get to both of the survivors.

The Covenant threw one more curve at ST Arizona. When Black tried to talk to Covey, he found the primary, secondary, and alternate FM frequencies jammed by the Covenant. Frustrated, Black smashed his radio and pulled out his Ultra-High Frequency survival radio. He was told that an Arc Light strike was being planned for this area as soon as possible.

By now, all the air assets—Navy, Marine, and Air Force—which had been scheduled to fly sorties into New Italy, were diverted to the Prairie Fire emergency surrounding ST Arizona. Covey directed numerous air strikes, including more gun and rocket runs from helicopters and gunships. The Sparrowhawks returned to make several runs. After refueling and reloading in Grendel, the attack craft returned to wreak havoc on the persistent Covenant troops. They pounded the jungle area between ST Arizona and the Air Force survivors as part of the daisy-chain tactic.

Around 1800 hours, a PJ Vulcan pilot, Air Force Major Don Olsen, called over the radio, "Blackjack, PJ 32. I'm parked down in the draw, in the trees from you. You have 20 minutes of fuel before I leave. Hurry! We're taking heavy ground fire."

Anything that couldn't be carried was thrown over the side of the cliff. As quickly as the wounded could move, they headed toward the PJ Vulcan. The gunship had literally cut away treetops and branches to nestle into the thick dark green foliage, thus reducing its profile to enemy gunners. Olsen had to keep the aircraft stable as there were large trees on all sides. The trees were large enough that they could severely damage the wings and cause the gunship to crash if he hit any of them.

Covey directed more air strikes in a daisy chain fashion in the portion of the jungle between ST Arizona and the PJ Vulcan. Watkins hoped this would drive out or kill the Covenant in the zone. Even that task became more difficult, as smoke from all of the expended ordnance continued to hang above the trees, decreasing visibility for pilots and gunners.

As they moved toward the hovering PJ Vulcan, ST Arizona entered a cool ravine before climbing the final hill to the gunship. There they encountered Sergeant Dean scavenging food. Soon they found Granier.

The Covenant focused heavily on the gunship, easing the pressure on ST Arizona. As the beleaguered recon team neared the PJ Vulcan, Black thought it felt like they were moving closer to the gates of hell itself. The Covenant troops were pouring small arms fire and fuel rods at the hovering ship while the door gunners and pilots intermittently fired the Minigun and rockets. Time was against them. The weather began to close in. The smoke from previous air strikes hung over the area for longer and longer periods of time before clearing enough for the next attacks from the air.

On the ground, the men of ST Arizona heard Covenant running through the bushes around them. Fortunately the Covenant failed to spot the Strike Team or the Air Force crewmen. Desperate, Black had to move his team onto a trail so it could move to the hovering PJ Vulcan more quickly. As the team moved up the trail, the tail gunner was shaking violently and had turned a pasty white. Team members set Chan down and proceeded to the aircraft. At the crest of the trail, they saw the PJ Vulcan taking hits and dealing out its own. Black saw someone firing an MA5D out of one of the windows.

As Black moved to the gunship, the intensity of gunfire seemed to multiply. The air was so full of lead and plasma he could see it. Fuel and bits of metal skin fell from the aircraft as they reached its underside. The jungle penetrator smashed to the ground next to him and raised three feet before he put three team members on the first load. Granier and a wounded ST Arizona team member were on the second hoist lift.

Despite Covenant gunfire, Black ran back to the bamboo thicket where he had left the remainder of the team. Chan, the dying tail gunner, pointed his M6D at the advancing Covenant and said, "I die here." He motioned for Black to return to the PJ Vulcan before firing five shots into an advancing Elite and shooting himself.

Black was running back to the ship when two jackals stepped onto the trail and pointed their carbines at him. Black grabbed the carbines by their searing barrels and stripped them from the Jackals. He backhanded the one on his right and smashed the other in the face with one of the weapons. He left the stunned Jackals lying there as he sprinted to the gunship, where he found the praying Corporal. The rest of the team was on board, firing any weapon they could get their hands on. As the jungle penetrator lifted Black and the Corporal upward, they were showered with hot spent casings from the belt fed machineguns being fired from inside of the aircraft.

As the PJ Vulcan slowly rose, Black felt the ship making upward surges from the fuel rods slamming into the armor-plated underside of the aircraft. It felt like a giant slugging the ship in the stomach, boosting it upward with each rocket blast. From his view above the fray, Watkins couldn't believe the bird kept flying. Somehow the pilot got the PJ Vulcan out of there.

Once clear of the jungle hole, the ship began its ascent out of the valley and the shadow of death. The door gunner removed his helmet and looked at Black, "We're on our way home."

When he stepped out of the PJ Vulcan, he was greeted by an ONI agent, a spook. "Lance Corporal Black? Congratulations on your promotion to Corporal. The UNSC cannot thank you enough for what you and your men did today."

"When did I get promoted?" Black asked, confused.

"When you are awarded the Medal of Honor, you'll be promoted to Corporal. It should happen early next week," The ONI agent said.

"I'm honored but I'm not a hero," Black responded.

"ONI disagrees. The heroism of you and your men is what the people need right now," The ONI agent told him.

"Well how did I assist you? It seems more like we were helped by everyone," Black asked.

"You and ST Arizona managed to hold off a force of over ten thousand Covenant Troops while a special strike team infiltrated the downed Super Carrier to destroy it," The ONI agent told him.

"You're rather forthcoming for a spook," Black said.

"I'm offering you a job. Corporal Mosk's father is too well connected to face real repercussions for his inactions today so you'll be forced out or silenced. Welcome to the Special Activities Division. We'll be seeing more of each other soon, Corporal Black," The ONI Agent said. As the ONI agent finished speaking, a massive earthquake shook the compound.

"What was that?" Black asked rhetorically.

"Blue Team," The ONI agent said before disappearing.

* * *

AN: It will make sense eventually


	9. Chapter 07

"So there we were, waiting for the Thresher Maw to make its move when suddenly the ground beneath our feet vibrates more than usual so we both jump out of the way but the Thresher Maw snags me by the leg and swallows me whole!" Grunt was oblivious to Miranda smacking her forehead behind him, his Battle Master, Shepard was amused and that's what mattered here. "I'm convinced that this is where I die so I decide to make the bastard pay by emptying my shotgun down its throat and turn on my Omni-blade and just start slashing at everything while he's trying to force me down his throat. I can feel explosions hitting this bastard so I know the Master Chief is still giving him hell on the outside. Then I cut something and there's another explosion around the same time and I can feel the thing falling to the ground and its muscles have stopped trying to force me down to its belly so I just walk out of its mouth to see the Master Chief just standing there like he sees this every day!" Almost the entire room was laughing now, even Samara and Miranda let out a chuckle at the young Krogan's enthusiasm. He then went on to tell them about how he beat Gatatog Uvenk to death with his bare hands and showed off the shotgun that Urdnot Wrex gave him. While Grunt was recounting his exploits, the Master Chief was having a mental conversation with Cortana.

"What happened earlier?" he asked.

"Chief, I don't know how long I can hold it together. Without a way home we're pretty much out of options for me," Cortana said

"How long would you say we have?" He asked.

"A month, maybe two," she said.

"I wouldn't even know who to ask for help here," he sighed.

"Neither do I," she replied, "This universe doesn't trust AI so there's very little research on the subject. Our only example was made in a completely different way."

"Could we ask EDI to take a look at you?" he asked.

"Maybe we could, but she works for Cerberus and they have their own agenda. I doubt they'd mind letting me go completely rampant and studying what's left of me. Or taking me away from you to study me," she said.

"That's not going to happen," he told her resolutely.

"Okay," she answered.

"What if you encrypt the data so that they have to help us to get access to it?" he wondered.

"That could work if we play it right," she responded, "But that still doesn't solve the issue that they don't know anything about our kind of AI and even if they did, I'm unique."

"We could come forward about you and our situation to the Commander and his XO," Master Chief offered.

"That may be our only option if we can't figure anything else out," Cortana said.

The Master Chief didn't know how to respond to that. He waited for the meeting to end before heading to his quarters so he could practice Spartan hand to hand. It was a mix of MCMAP and Krav Maga that was taught to the Spartans during their early years of training. It had served him well against the Covenant as it was designed to be used against bigger, stronger enemies. There were no wasted movements, just quick, precise strikes and overwhelming force against weak points designed to break your enemy down. He was several minutes into battling an imaginary Jiralhanae Chieftain when the elevator opened up. The Master Chief immediately stopped what he was doing and faced a petite redheaded woman.

"Good afternoon, Master Chief. My name is Kelly Chambers," she said.

"Afternoon, ma'am," he replied.

"I'm here to give you a psychological evaluation," she said.

"No," he answered before turning away.

For a second, she wasn't sure how to respond but then had an idea. "That's fine. Do you mind if I sit here and work while you go about your business?" she asked. The Master Chief shrugged and went back to sparring with his imaginary Brute. "Why are you still wearing your armor?" she asked without looking up from her Omni-tool.

"Always ready," he answered.

"What's it like?" she asked.

"What?"

"Your armor, what is it like to be inside of it?" she clarified.

"Stronger, faster, better protected, more aware," he answered as he delivered a vicious kick to the Brute's spine. He knew what she was trying to do but she hadn't gone around his refusal yet.

"What do you think of this ship?" she asked.

"Nimble, lightly armored, multiple choke points, lack of internal defenses," he said as he stomped the Brute's skull in.

"If you had to defend this ship, how would you do it?" she asked, intrigued.

"Defend against whom? Am I alone?" he asked as he caught his breath and put his guard up again. This time he was facing a rogue Spartan. Despite being closer than blood, they were trained to be prepared for any eventuality.

Kelly pondered the question. She wasn't an expert on military strategy and tactics but needed a way to connect with this man so he would trust her. "Against the Geth and yes, you're alone," she finally said.

"Head to engineering and overload the reactor before boarding their own ship and capturing it," he said.

"But the ship would be destroyed," Kelly pointed out.

"The ship was lost anyway. It was only a matter of time," he countered an uppercut from the rogue Spartan.

"Speaking from experience?" She asked.

The Master Chief didn't respond. He focused on the rogue Spartan that existed only in his mind. Eventually Kelly realized that was all she was getting from the man so she headed back up the elevator. When she got back to her station, she realized that the notes she had taken had deleted themselves. _That's strange_ , she thought, she must have forgotten to save them. That left her disappointed but she remembered that she still needed to crack Miranda's shell.

"Miranda, can you talk for a minute?" Kelly asked when she made her way into the XO's office.

"What do you need?" she asked without looking up from her terminal. There was a lot of work in arranging a data transfer of this magnitude without anybody noticing and she'd be damned if there was any error on her end.

"I was wondering if you'd like to talk about your f-" Kelly began.

"Get out," Miranda said.

"But-"

"I think you misunderstand your job here," Miranda said, "You are here to ensure that our more unstable elements don't go out of control. Not to give me a psychological evaluation. Focus the bulk of your efforts on Grunt and Jack and report to Shepard and myself if anybody seems to have trouble focusing on the mission."

"Understood, ma'am," Kelly said as she left.

Miranda sighed and made sure to give the woman a slight bonus. She didn't enjoy being a bitch but it had to be done sometimes. Maybe she enjoyed it a little bit. She was about to log off when she received a disturbing notification on her terminal. Somebody working for her father had been spotted on Ilium uncomfortably close to Oriana's home. They were a day away from Earth and it would take a week to get to Ilium from there. Seeing no other choice, she activated a counteragent to protect Oriana and her family. Hopefully that would keep her father off of their trail long enough for them to get there. The Master Chief's data had better be worth it.

Grunt was looking through the Extranet for something to read. He had started looking for Krogan literature but it seemed impossible to find. Then he decided to research his new Clan leader, Wrex, only to be distracted by something called a Tyrannosaurus Rex, a "dinosaur" from Earth millions of years ago. It was fascinating stuff. After searching for hours, he got back to his original task and eventually settled on an audio book written about adventure. Grunt downloaded it and let it play as he gazed out his window to see the Master Chief practicing some form of hand to hand.

There was something about the Master Chief's way of fighting that was different. It didn't seem to suit his large size and power. He almost looked like he was fighting somebody more powerful than he was. Maybe he was? That's an interesting thought. The man was large, heavy, and powerful, even compared to a Krogan. _What could be so large and powerful that the Master Chief was the weaker combatant?_ He let the book play as he listened to the words of Hemingway. He would ask the human more about himself later and see if he couldn't learn a thing or two from him.

"Robert Cohn was once middleweight boxing champion of Princeton. Do not think I am very much impressed by that as a boxing title, but it meant a lot to Cohn. He cared nothing for boxing, in fact he disliked it, but he learned it painfully and thoroughly to counteract the feeling of inferiority and shyness he had felt on being treated as a Jew at Princeton…"

Garrus joined Shepard at the bar in Kasumi's room. He had been looking for his friend for a while and couldn't find him until Kasumi had helped him. Shepard had had too much to drink and was mumbling incoherently. Kasumi had offered to help him up to his room but the glare he gave her made her reconsider.

Garrus looked at his friend, clutching a nearly empty bottle of Jack in one hand, a notebook in the other, and staring off into space. "Are you okay, Shepard?" Garrus asked. Shepard didn't respond. It was then he noticed the notebook. "Can I see that?" The Turian asked as he gestured towards it. Shepard turned his wrist towards Garrus, allowing him to take it out of his hands.

On the first page, the first line read LCPL Youngblood A. Travis 2152-2170 and it was followed by a picture of a young man with bright, optimistic eyes. On the next page was LCPL Gustafson A. Brady 2153-2170, a young, cocky grin looked back at him. This went on for several pages, detailing every life Shepard had lost under his command. There were a lot of pages. "Come on, Shepard," Garrus said, "Let's get you to your room." Shepard finished his drink and followed the Turian up to his quarters. He couldn't bring himself to care that people might see him in his inebriated state. This wasn't a military ship anyway. As far as the brass was concerned, he was aiding a terrorist organization. It wasn't his fault they decided to ignore the Reaper threat! "So how did you get that notebook, Shepard?" Garrus asked. "I can't imagine that it managed to survive the original Normandy's crash."

"I memorized the names," Shepard told him, "then I pulled their pictures from the Alliance records. Two hundred and three lives, Garrus."

"I understand," he said.

"You do, don't you?" Shepard said. The two finished their trip in silent contemplation over the men they've lost.

"I was going to ask you if it ever got easier," Garrus said.

"No. You learn to deal with it but sometimes you don't deal so well," Shepard responded.

"Ms. Lawson," EDI said, "The Master Chief wishes to speak with you in private."

Miranda rolled off her bed and told EDI to send him up to her quarters in five minutes. She quickly got dressed and brewed a pot of coffee. What in the galaxy was the Master Chief doing awake already? He was still training in his quarters five minutes before she had gone to sleep. She took her coffee black and unmodified. No excess calories or sugar in her carefully controlled diet.

She had only begun to sip on her coffee when there was a quiet knock on the door. "Come in," she said as she took a seat at her desk. In walked the fully armored Master Chief. She wasn't sure how he had managed to be so gentle with her door with those gauntlets. "What can I help you with, Master Chief?" She asked as the door closed behind him.

"This conversation has to be private," he said. She nodded and input a command to shut off all surveillance and recording equipment before gesturing to him to continue. "I need your word that you won't take action against me or my equipment," he said.

"Why would I do that?" She asked, puzzled.

"Your word," he demanded.

She didn't like being bossed around but agreed anyway, "Fine, you have my word."

"I am in possession of a highly advanced Artificial Intelligence by the name of Cortana and she is degrading. We don't have anywhere to turn for help but she'll die soon if we don't take action," he said.

Miranda was shocked into silence for about five seconds. "You have an AI onboard and didn't think to tell us?" she asked.

"Your people have an irrational distrust of Artificial Intelligence. I wanted to know if I could trust you before saying anything. I still don't know but we're out of options," he replied.

"You would risk your life for an AI?" She asked.

"Yes. And I've walked into Hell for my friend before; I'll do it again," he declared.

Miranda took another sip of her coffee. She wasn't being paid nearly enough for this. "How can an AI die?" She asked.

"Where I'm from, AI are modeled from a human brain. After a while, because of so much information that an AI has, they begin to think themselves to death similar to if a human were to think with so much of their brain that they stopped sending impulses to their heart and lungs," the Master Chief said.

"How does your AI compare to EDI?" she asked.

"EDI resembles one of our "dumb" AI's while Cortana is our most advanced "smart" AI and has dealt with technology beyond either of our understanding," he replied.

"That's… incredible," Miranda said. "We could ask EDI to help see what she can do. If you can assure me that Cortana poses no threat to our crew, I'm willing to help. Provided that we get a chance to study her of course," Miranda told him.

The Master Chief was silent for a moment as he mentally discussed it with Cortana, "are you sure about this? They may try to double-cross us."

"I'm sure. I'm fairly confident that even in my current state, I can overcome any cyber warfare attempts they make on me. I trust you to deal with any external threats," she assured him.

"Okay," he said out loud to both women. "But don't try anything," he warned Miranda.

"Of course," she replied, "I'm hoping you'll be very useful in advancing mankind and I really don't want to piss you off. I can take a guess at what your augmentations do but even with my PhDs, I have no idea how they were done to you. I need you to trust me if we're ever going to bring about humanity's next evolutionary step. Who knows where that'll take us?"

"I need this to remain as quiet as possible," the Master Chief said.

"Don't worry, nobody has to know," Miranda said.

"Your boss," he said, leaving the question unspoken. She may have been helpful so far but she was too similar to an ONI agent to trust unreservedly

"Doesn't have to know, I promise," she answered. She noticed he was still staring at her, "he won't know." He nodded in response. "I'll need to set up an area where we can isolate Cortana from the ship's systems but still allow us to interact with her. I don't suppose you can help me with that?" she asked.

The Master Chief walked over to her terminal and transferred some files for the design of a Riemann Matrix capable Crystal Data Isolation Chamber similar to the "box of silence". _Of course he does,_ Miranda began compiling a list of things they'll need. It would be capable of storing an absolutely massive amount of data. After they were done with the Master Chief's AI, they could keep a local copy of what the Master Chief planned to send Cerberus. The structure didn't appear very large, but it did require precision manufacturing and unconventional materials. As they were still a few hours away from Earth, she could have it ready by the time they got there. She reactivated the scanners and recording equipment in her office and attempted to contact Shepard to inform him of the recent developments only to discover that he was still asleep. He had been out for eight hours already. _Alcohol_ , she thought with disdain. It is a vile drink that turns even the most respectable of men into complete scoundrels. She never understood the fascination with it. Miranda made sure that Kelly would deliver the message to Shepard as well as spend more time with him to keep his mind focused on the task at hand. Humanity couldn't afford for him to develop PTSD. _Then again,_ she looked up at the Master Chief and thought about his mysterious technology and combat effectiveness. _Maybe humanity has a new hope_.

"Master Chief," she said, "we're going to have to talk about how you're going to escort me when we get to Earth." He turned his head so that she was staring into the bronze faceplate. "Your armor is going to attract a lot of attention. In fact, even without your armor, you'll be attracting a lot of attention." She remembered his extremely pale and scarred face. "I can't put you into Alliance armor because we need your armor's processing power." She waited a few seconds for him to say something before she remembered who she was talking to. "How comfortable are you with stealth operations?" she asked.

"Have you ever heard me coming?" He asked. It was a good point now that she thought about it. In armor like that, she should hear him coming from a mile away but he could rival Kasumi's ability to sneak around and she has the tactical cloak.

"That's a good point but we're going to have to take it a little further. No doubt you're familiar with our ninja. She happens to have a very advanced version of what we call a Tactical Cloak. She can stay invisible indefinitely no matter how fast she moves. Our standard version builds up a lot of heat the harder it works so you have to move slowly to keep it on. Otherwise you have to wait for it to cool down." The Master Chief nodded. He could see where she was going with this. "Hold out your left arm," she said as she pulled something out of her desk. "It took me a while to make but this should cover your entire armor," she said as she put a small wrist computer onto him. "It needed a larger power source than a regular Omni-tool can provide to cover something your size for as long as we need. Why don't you try it out?" she requested.

He pressed the button on it and quickly faded into the background; his visor automatically compensated for his sudden invisibility as the computers approximated an image of himself based on the armor's location. The MJOLNIR didn't quite have an ODST's VISR but it got the job done. He also recognized a new meter added to his HUD. At the current rate of power consumption, he had several minutes of invisibility.

"Excellent," she remarked. "Does it link to your armor alright?"

"I see the meter, is there supposed to be a timer as well?" he replied.

"No, I decided to keep everything as bare-bones as possible to maximize power. If you'd like, I can have one added to it fairly quickly," she responded.

"Unnecessary, ma'am," he replied as he pressed the button again to turn the device off. "Thank you."

"Of course, Master Chief," she answered with a smile. "The walk from the landing pad to our destination should take us eight minutes. Your cloak will last for ten at that pace. Stay close."

"Understood, ma'am," he replied.

"I haven't seen Earth in years," Miranda said as the two of them rode the shuttle to their destination. The Master Chief found himself back on Cairo Station with a friend.

"Earth… I haven't seen it in years. When I shipped out for Basic, the orbital defense grid was all theory and politics. Now look! The Cairo is just one of three hundred geo-sync platforms. That MAC gun can put a round clean through a Covenant capital ship. With coordinated fire from the Athens and the Malta, nothing's getting past this battle cluster in one piece. Ships have been arriving all morning. Nobody's saying much, but I think something big is about to happen."

"It's been nearly twenty years since I left home. At the time, the defense fleet could barely qualify as such. Now it would take two Sovereign-class Reapers to get through. It's still not enough if the Reapers arrive. Not nearly enough."

"How long do you have?" he asked.

"It could be weeks, months, or even years but they could even attack a century from now and we wouldn't be ready for them if we let politicians have their way," she responded somewhat heated. She quickly regained her composure as the shuttle touched down and the Master Chief went invisible. He opened a COM Link to her ear piece in case they needed to communicate. Behind them, the shuttle went back to the Normandy to give the crew some shore leave.

The Master Chief had a suppressed M6J folded up on his hip as well as several 30-round magazines for it in case things got ugly and he had to shoot his way out. It would be a nice change of pace.

Fortunately or unfortunately, the mission went off without a hitch. The Master Chief used his stealth to avoid detection until he and Miranda met with a driver who took them to the secure location where the Master Chief uploaded the relevant data which was then sent into cyberspace. The Master Chief was somewhat confused at the fact that he didn't have to shoot anybody. Regardless, he carried on like Mendez had taught him to.

When they arrived back on the Normandy, construction of the RMCDIC was well underway in Miranda's private quarters. "Chief," Cortana said. "I don't know how I feel about this anymore."

"Why not?" he asked.

"I. WILL. NOT. BE. SILENCED!" she shouted over his armor's speakers, alarming Miranda.

"Was that your AI?" she asked.

The Master Chief nodded, "we don't have long."

Miranda turned to the contractors, "I'll double your pay if you finish within the hour. Don't mess anything up though or you won't live long enough to spend it."

"Yes, ma'am!" the head contractor responded and they all doubled their pace. It was then that Miranda noticed the Master Chief walking away.

"Where are you headed, Master Chief?" she asked as she turned to follow him.

"Airlock," he responded.

"Why?" Miranda asked when she realized he wasn't joking.

"I'm going to vent myself into space," he said. Again, he wasn't joking.

"Why would you do something like that?" she asked.

"So she can't jump out of my suit if she goes rogue," he answered.

"Is she that much of a threat?"

"She has control again for now but that can change at any moment," the Master Chief replied. "You have ninety minutes when I hit the vacuum to pick me up before I asphyxiate."

"You can't take a shuttle?" she asked. It hardly seemed necessary to her for him to take the risk of death if there was a simpler alternative.

He shook his head, "it has a connection to the Extranet. I want to minimize our risk of failure."

"Good luck, Master Chief," she responded. Miranda let him step into the airlock before venting him into space. She then returned to her quarters to aid in the construction.

"What the fuck do you mean you got the wrong parts, Stark!" Ledoux, the head contractor was yelling at one of his subordinates when she arrived. She had a sinking feeling in her stomach. Not as bad as the contractors did when they noticed she had entered. So her reputation preceded her. Good.

"You have five minutes to tell me what's going on and then we're going to fix it," she said in a tone that allowed for no resistance.

"I swear when I was looking at the schematics, it said we needed a Wylde Accelerator Matrix. Now it's saying we need a High Fidelity Otani Matrix," Stark told her.

Miranda looked at her copy of the schematics and saw that it said they needed both. When she questioned about the apparent discrepancy, she saw that a small bit of code had been corrupted in transmission. Ledoux had one corrupted copy, Stark had another."Proceed as best you can. I'll see about getting the HFOM," she told them as she headed towards the Normandy lab to meet with Mordin.

"Ah, Dr. Lawson. Pleasant surprise. What can I help you with?" he began.

Miranda forwarded him the schematics for the HFOM. "I need this now," she said.

"High Fidelity Otani Matrix. Theorized to be used in quantum computing. Don't have one at the moment unfortunately. Could ask some contacts," Mordin replied.

"I need one in half an hour," she told him.

Mordin nodded, "Certain components can be recycled. Others must be manufactured with raw materials. Risk danger to crew otherwise. Lucky Shepard mines resources often. Will send list. Strange request though. May I inquire why?"

"The Master Chief's life depends on it."

"Master Chief organic life form. Unless very good synthetic approximation. Hardware degrading? No. Too obvious. Possible armor malfunction but doesn't explain danger to life unless armor doubles as life support system. Rather crude for such advanced technology," Mordin started rambling to himself.

"Mordin!" Miranda snapped him out of it before he was too far gone. "I can't tell you specifics but I need this now. We'll make one ourselves if we have to."

Meet back here in ten minutes." Mordin immediately began inputting commands into his console with one hand and onto his Omni-tool with the other. If Miranda had time, she would have appreciated the mental capacity it took to multitask on such a level. Instead, she ordered several members of the crew to get the parts she needed in order to save time. Everything was delivered to their lab in exactly eight minutes and thirty two seconds. Mordin finished getting the components one minute and five seconds later. Miranda was glad that 3-D Printing had come so far in its two hundred years of existence. The supplementation of alien technology had certainly helped the process in the last thirty. All that remained for the two of them was to assemble the components properly and wait for the contractors to finish everything else.

"The Master Chief has a foreign AI," Mordin said. It wasn't a question or accusation, merely an observation.

"Now what makes you think such a ridiculous idea, Professor?" Miranda asked.

"Design lends itself towards isolating a software program while still being able to interact with it. Only real use is in counter cyber warfare. No program short of an AI could require so much storage space. A powerful one. Obvious suspect is Reaper technology but doubtful you'd keep that secret. Earlier comment that Master Chief's life depends on this machine implies that the Master Chief either is or has an AI that needs to be isolated," Mordin said.

"I see your STG training hasn't gone to waste," Miranda said. "I need you to keep this quiet. I'll tell Shepard when it's done. The STG can't know either."

"Yes. Council would likely try to destroy both AI if discovered regardless of precautions. Could prove disastrous to current mission," Mordin agreed.

"Ms. Lawson," Ledoux said apprehensively. "We have a problem. There was an error in the wiring of one of the pieces delivered to us. It fried a component completely. We can repair it or work around it but that'll take some time."

"How much time to repair it? Will the machine still do its job if we make a workaround?" she asked.

"At our fastest, it will take seventy minutes if we decide to repair it," he told her. "It would be forty minutes for a workaround but there's no telling if it'll work for what you need.

"That's cutting it too close. What can we do to speed the process along?" she asked.

Over the next hour, Miranda and Mordin helped the contractors build the RMCDIC as quickly as possible, and then she boarded a shuttle to pick up the Master Chief seven minutes before his oxygen expired.

"I see you're doing well. What about your AI?" Miranda asked.

"She's quiet for now. We need to hurry," he answered. There was no telling how long Cortana's state would last before she lost control again.

* * *

AN: another chapter without any action. Even in times of war, most of a grunt's time is spent out of combat and just killing time. However the plot still has to move forward and making this specific chapter any longer just to throw in some action would seem like it's dragging along to me.


	10. Chapter 08

"Shepard, I'm glad to see you're no longer hung-over. I find myself in the unpleasant position of asking for your help," Miranda told him as he walked into her office. "I don't like discussing personal matters but this is important."

"Miranda, you're part of my crew. What do you need?" Shepard responded.

"Do you remember what I told you about my father building a dynasty? There was another reason that I went to Cerberus for protection," Miranda began as she stood up and walked to the porthole. "I have a sister, a genetic twin, and he's still hunting her. Cerberus has kept her safe until now. She's living a normal life on Ilium. Safe and hidden from my father."

"I'm guessing your father tracked her down," Shepard said. He could tell that this was going to hurt.

"Precisely, Commander. My sources indicate that he knows that she's on Ilium. I've tried to keep her hidden without impacting her life but I'm out of options. He's too close. I need to relocate my sister's family before it's too late," Miranda said.

"Is your sister's family okay with relocating? How much do they know?" Shepard asked.

"They know nothing. They're completely uninvolved. Normal even," Miranda told him.

"So are we talking a spouse and some kids?" Shepard asked.

"An adult couple and a teenage girl," Miranda said.

"Do we have to worry about the parents at all?" Shepard asked.

"They'll be fine," Miranda told him. She was hiding something.

"Miranda, I need to know everything so we can plan accordingly," Shepard told her.

Miranda sighed, "She's genetically my twin but she's sixteen years younger than me. She turns 19 in a week. The adult couple is her foster parents."

"I see," Shepard said. "What kind of resistance can we expect?"

"My father likes to use local mercenary forces. On Ilium, that means Eclipse," Miranda said.

"Okay so we can expect a lot of tech and Biotics when things go SNAFU. Luckily you're good with both and I can take care of most enemies with a simple charge. Who else should we take?" Shepard asked. They both came to the same conclusion at once.

"The Master Chief," Miranda said, beating him to the punch.

"It would give us another chance to see what he's got," Shepard agreed. "Oh and thanks for telling me about our stowaway. I would've hated to find out the hard way," Shepard said. The hard way here meaning when the new AI decides to vent the atmosphere into space and watch them asphyxiate.

They both went down to the Master Chief's area of the Hangar to find him outside of his armor and standing over a panting Grunt. "I may be bigger and stronger than any human you know but weak points are the same: joints, spine, major arteries, and the base of my skull. You have to find and exploit them. That's enough for today."

"Wrex told me to take him under my wing; I guess he asked you to teach him a few things yourself?" Shepard asked as Grunt got into the elevator.

The Master Chief shook his head, "Grunt is strong but reckless and wild. Pure strength won't always be enough. Our lives may depend on him one day."

Spoken like a true professional. "We have another mission we want to evaluate you on," Shepard said. The Master Chief nodded so he continued, "We're providing support for an extraction team sent for Miranda's sister's family. We expect to engage Eclipse mercenaries who are versed in tech and Biotic warfare. Miranda and I are going to be a distraction if necessary and we want you providing Guardian Angel support from a rooftop in case things get hairy. If it seems like we need direct support, you're to get in a sky car and move in ASAP."

"Understood," he said.

Shepard left but Miranda hung back a moment longer, "This mission is very important to me. Oriana is the only family I have."

"We'll protect her," the Master Chief said resolutely.

Miranda nodded, "We'll be at Ilium in two days. I promise that I'll do everything that I can for your friend."

"Thank you," he told her.

"I made a promise," she explained. Apparently keeping promises was something else that they had in common.

The Master Chief zoomed in on the sky car that Shepard and Lawson were taking. Earlier they had radioed that something had gone wrong but were sparse on details in case anybody was listening. The sky car was flanked by two gunships; the Master Chief quickly was about to shoot them down before Shepard radioed in, "Hold fire. We're going to see if we can't reason with them."

The Master Chief tapped his COM twice in acknowledgment. The sky car pulled over into a docking bay, giving the Master Chief a clear line of sight. Several Eclipse mercenaries stepped out of the gunships. One of them walked toward Shepard and Lawson.

"Since you're not firing yet, I trust you know who I am," Miranda said

"Yeah. They said you'd be in the car. You're the bitch who kidnapped our boss' little girl," the Master Chief heard the man respond over Miranda's mike.

"Kidnapped?" Miranda responded incredulously. "This doesn't involve you. I suggest you take your men and go."

"You think you've got it all lined up, huh? Captain Enyala's already moving in on the kid. She knows about Niket. He won't be helping you," The mercenary leader responded smugly.

"What do you mean, Niket won't be helping us?" Shepard asked. The Master Chief sensed something was wrong.

"Nothing you need to worry about. Nobody's going to get killed unless you do something stupid," the mercenary leader said. "You walk away now and the girl goes back to her father, and everybody's happy."

"Everybody but my sister… and me," Miranda said coldly.

"Should we be talking to Captain Enyala about this?" Shepard asked. While the Master Chief understood the need to gather intelligence, the man had already shown he wasn't willing to negotiate so he wasn't sure why Shepard didn't just signal for the Master Chief to kill him.

"You don't want to talk to the captain. She's not as polite as I am," The mercenary leader said. "She's the best commando I've ever seen. I've seen her tear people in half with her Biotics. And she's getting paid a lot to stop you."

"If she gets in my way, she'll never have a chance to spend it," a very unimpressed Miranda responded.

"You're not getting Miranda's sister. If you push this, it'll go badly for you," Shepard said. That was his cue. Remember: get your natural point of aim, slow and steady breathing, slow and steady squeeze.

"Captain Enyala ordered us to give you one chance to walk away. But this whole time we've been talking, my men have been lining up shots," the Mercenary leader said as his head exploded. Before the mercenaries could respond, a shipping container, previously suspended by a heavy chain, fell onto a half dozen mercenaries. Then they heard the sonic boom of two 14.5mm High Explosive, Armor Piercing Incendiary rounds. The confusion that followed gave Shepard and Miranda plenty of time to head for cover.

"Hey! Leave one for Miranda and me!" Shepard said half-joking over the radio. Sure enough, the Master Chief sent one bullet within an inch of the heads of the final two survivors, overloading their shields. They almost breathed a sigh of relief before they remembered too late that Shepard and Lawson were still active players on the field. One was thrown face first into a shipping container, breaking his neck. The other didn't even have time to think before an Omni-blade was driven through his neck at speeds only possible with Biotics.

Shepard and Miranda walked towards an elevator before Miranda picked something up off the ground. "Hang on, I've got one of their radios. I'll patch us in; see if we can get an idea of what we're up against."

"If Eclipse knows where Oriana is, they'll be moving in on her soon. We need to hurry," Shepard said

"Agreed. But I'm a bit worried about what the mercenary said," Miranda responded. "If they've gotten to Niket somehow, this is going to be harder than I'd planned. According to the specs I've reviewed, we'll need to cut through the cargo processing yard to get to Oriana."

"Can you tell me anything about the cargo processing yard?" Shepard asked.

"We'll be moving through conveyor systems. There'll be a lot of movement. Finding targets won't be easy so we'll need to stay sharp," she told him. "And these cargo transports carry hazardous materials so watch what you shoot at."

"Of course they are. Did you catch that, Guardian Angel?" Shepard asked. Why he had insisted on giving the Master Chief a code name that described his job exactly was beyond him. He simply tapped his mike in response.

"I hope your friend can be trusted," Shepard said although he had a feeling that it wasn't the case.

"Absolutely, Niket is one of my closest friends. I suppose that you could say that he was my only real friend," Miranda responded somewhat less confident than she'd intended to sound.

"Is there a chance your father could be using Niket to get to you?" Shepard asked.

"I'm sure that he's tried but Niket is one of the few people who understands what my father is really like," she was more confident this time. "I trusted him with my life when I ran from my father, Shepard. He wouldn't betray me now."

"Then let's go find Niket and Oriana," Shepard said. "Guardian Angel, we're taking an elevator to the cargo yard. I'm sending you the coordinates so you can get a better position." The Master Chief again tapped his mike in acknowledgement. _Would it kill him to speak sentences now and then?_ Shepard thought. Bringing the Master Chief was less like bringing a companion on a mission and more like playing an RPG with God-mode unlocked. Still, he wasn't complaining as long as he could let the Master Chief loose on the Reapers and/or Collectors. The elevator ride was mercifully short. "Guardian Angel, are you in position?" Shepard asked.

"Negative. Stuck in traffic," the Master Chief responded. Shepard had forgotten about rush hour on Ilium.

"We don't have time to wait, I'll keep you updated on our movements so catch up when you can," Shepard told him. The Master Chief tapped his mike in acknowledgment.

Miranda saw them when Shepard did. "They're on the far side of the conveyor line. Time your shots!" Sure enough, the cargo containers would occasionally pass between the two groups.

The two of them took cover behind some shipping containers and lay down suppressive fire as they moved closer to get a better shot. Seeing an opening, Shepard attacked a cargo container marked "flammable, highly reactive" that was a bit too close to some mercenaries. Or perfectly close depending on your perspective. Between her Biotic Warp and his bullets sparking the container, the mercenaries found out too late what they were planning. This lead Shepard to wonder who exactly paid for Eclipse mercenaries. Does anybody with Biotic potential or technical prowess get in? Is there any kind of training period or screening process? A kid could read a book on infantry tactics and come out a better fighter than these guys.

The other mercenaries made sure to stay away from the containers that proved hazardous to their colleagues' health but several found bullets in their brains before they found suitable cover. An M-9 Tempest may not be the most powerful infantry weapon but at 900 rounds per minute, most shields would collapse in less than two seconds if he got every bullet on target. A little trick he had learned during N7 training was to use his Biotics whenever he fired a weapon so that he could resist recoil more. That and Cerberus' upgrades meant his normally inaccurate weapon may as well have laser targeting. The Alliance really needed to stop selling contracts off to the lowest bidder*. That meant that any time an Eclipse mercenary decided to stick their head out of cover, they would find themselves shorter by six or seven inches.

"This is Enyala, keep the bitch back. The kid is nearing the transport terminal," an Asari voice came over the radio. They needed to hurry. They moved down the hallway and kept pressing forward. A few mercenaries tried to ambush them with the help of a few mechs and found out what it meant to be on the wrong side of two very good, very angry Biotics.

"I don't care how many mechs you lose! Just stall them, damn it!" Enyala said. What a charming lady. They cut their way through another several dozen mercenaries, either using their submachine guns or Biotics to leave a trail of carnage that would do Jack proud.

"Master Chief, where are you?" Shepard asked as he and Miranda rounded a corner, coming face to face with two YMIR mechs. The mechs aimed their missile launchers at the duo so Shepard grabbed Miranda and used a Biotic Charge to get them behind cover. They immediately threw up a Barrier as their cover was destroyed by the hail of missiles. The Master Chief fell, like an Archangel, directly on the head of one of the YMIR mechs. His half ton mass falling from several hundred feet built enough momentum to crush the thing even if he hadn't made a point to drive his fist through the CPU, which was conveniently placed in the "head" for some reason. The other YMIR mech tried to level its machinegun at the Master Chief, only to have it batted aside with enough force to break a Krogan's jaw.

"Niket has reached the terminal. He'll switch the family over to our transport," Captain Enyala said over the radio.

Shepard and Miranda fired their SMGs at the thing but with that level of armor, they may as well have been throwing rocks but he didn't want to risk using a heavy weapon since the Master Chief decided to engage it in CQB. "Go on ahead. I'll catch up," the Master Chief told them. Understanding the urgency, they complied.

STG Operative 16807-G was running his routine scans over Ilium when he noticed some of the spy-cams weren't sending any signals. There was a lot of Electromagnetic Interference in the way. He sent a drone to investigate, only for it to stop responding as well. Something was seriously wrong so he sent another, this time, making it keep its distance. What he saw surprised him. An entire cargo bay looked to be the ground zero for a multi-ton bomb. What's more is that there seemed to be the sounds of a battle around the corner where the drone couldn't fly. 16807-G scrambled a STG recon unit to the site, hoping they can get there in time to figure what exactly is going on and who was involved. Just in case.

Sekok Volane moved into position as soon as he could. The trail of carnage was horrifying. Many of the bodies looked as if they had been shot with explosive projectiles. Others were missing limbs entirely and several shipping containers had exploded or been gutted, spilling their contents. The sounds of combat was getting faint; they had to hurry. He and his team ran as fast as they could while keeping their profile to a minimum to avoid detection. What they saw was… unnerving. A fairly large mech was ripping a YMIR apart with its bare hands. Mind you that this YMIR was twice the size of the other mech. Next to the two combatants, was another destroyed YMIR that looked to have been crushed by a tank. The green mech broke the YMIR's legs off and executed it with a stomp to the CPU before running off. The recon team tried to keep up but it ran fast enough to keep up with a sky car on a highway. The aesthetics were odd. The mech looked like it had been designed by a Krogan but with the shape of a human. Whereas most Council races had a sleek, pleasing appearance, this thing was bulky and tough like everything the Krogan built. As if it was made for the express purpose of killing Krogan. The weapons were also of a pre-contact Human appearance but as far as he knew, no human organization could build something like this.

One member of the team accidentally got too close to the mech. It turned around, drew its rifle and fired two bullets at the Salarian's head despite the cloaking he wore. It then walked towards the downed Salarian and looked around. The team drew their weapons in a vain attempt to defend themselves. The mech put one other Salarian down with two headshots before the surviving two members of the team opened fire and hit empty space as the mech moved so fast he seemed to teleport. _Did it use Biotics?_ The thought of a Biotic mech was terrifying. Before he could ponder the thought, Volane saw the mech rip his teammate's head off with one hand and then shot Volane three times in the stomach.

"Niket? But… that can't be right. Maybe the captain knows we're listening in and she's feeding misinformation about Niket making a switch," Miranda said as Shepard pressed the button for the appropriate level on the elevator. "Or maybe it means something else. Niket wouldn't do that. Damn it, why won't this thing go any faster?" She used her Omni-tool to hack the elevator to move faster.

"What makes you so sure that Niket wouldn't turn on you?" Shepard asked.

"He could've turned on me when I ran away. I'm sure my father tried to buy him off. If he didn't do it then, why would he do it now?" Miranda said, still trying to convince herself.

"Did Niket know that you took Oriana from her father?" Shepard asked.

"No. He just found out about that recently. It was too personal to involve someone else. I never really thought about it, but maybe… no. He'd have to understand why I did it. He knows what I went through," she told him.

Shepard nodded, "You know him better than I do." They exited the elevator and heard voices.

"Listen to me. I've got authorization to change their booking!" Niket said to an Asari Transport Officer.

"I'm sorry, sir. We're under security lockdown. Until the situation in the cargo terminal is resolved, no passengers can be rebooked," the Transport Officer said in that way that let you know she'd been doing customer service for way too long and couldn't bring herself to care anymore.

"This isn't worth my time, Niket. I get paid regardless of how the girl gets there," Captain Enyala said.

"No! I was told that I could handle this my way. We're not traumatizing the family any more than we—" Niket saw Shepard and Miranda round the corner. "Miri…" he said as realization slapped him in the face.

"This should be fun," Captain Enyala said as she lifted a Claymore shotgun and aimed it at Miranda. It would've been comical to watch had they not been on the business end of it. Shepard and Miranda raised their pistols in response. The Asari Transport Officer tried to run, only to receive a shotgun blast in the back, mangling her entire body for her trouble.

"Niket. You sold me out," Miranda said in a voice Shepard hadn't heard in a long time.

"Your call, Miranda," Shepard said.

"Why, Niket? You were my friend. You helped me get away from my father," Miranda said

"Yes! Because you wanted to leave. That was your choice! But if I'd known that you'd stolen a baby—" he responded.

"I didn't steal her, I rescued her!" Miranda stated.

"From a life of wealth and happiness? You weren't saving her! You were getting back at your father!" Niket shot back.

"How did Miranda's father turn you?" Shepard asked.

"They told me that you'd kidnapped your baby sister all those years ago. They said I could help get her back peacefully with no trauma to the family. I told them that you'd never do that and that they could go to hell. Then you finally told me what you'd done. I called them back that night," he said.

"Why didn't you call me, Niket? We've been through a lot. You should've let me explain!" Miranda demanded.

"I deserved to know that you'd stolen your sister, Miri. I deserved to know you were with Cerberus. But I had to hear it from your father first," he said bitterly.

"How much did Miranda's father pay you?" Shepard asked.

"A great deal," Niket said.

"Damn it, Niket! You were the only one I trusted from that life!" Miranda said.

"He knew you felt that way. That's why he bought me," Niket said.

"So you just took his money," Miranda said disappointed.

"Don't get holy with me, Miri. You took his money for years," Niket said.

"Whether or not you agree with Miranda, Oriana has been with her family for years now," Shepard said to Niket.

"Her father can still give her a better life," Niket responded.

"You don't know what my father wants for her," Miranda said.

"I know that I've been poor, Miri. I didn't much care for it."

"He wants to take a girl away from the only family she's ever known. Doesn't that tell you something?" Miranda asked.

Meanwhile, Shepard tapped his mike, the Master Chief responded, "En route. Keep stalling."

"I knew Eclipse was willing to get their hands dirty but kidnapping a kid?" Shepard asked Captain Enyala.

"I'm not stealing her, I'm rescuing her. Come on, Niket. Let's finish this bitch off and get out of here." Enyala said.

"Take your best shot," Miranda said.

"If you're working for Miranda's father, that means he knows about Oriana. We need a new solution," Shepard said.

"Miranda's father has no information about Oriana," Niket said sadly. "I knew you had spy programs in your father's system, Miri, so I kept it private. I'm the only one who knows."

"That also means that you're the only loose end. This isn't how I wanted it to end, Niket. I'm going to miss you…" Miranda said as she began to pull the trigger.

Shepard made her point her gun away, "Miranda, wait! You don't want to do this."

"This has to end here, Shepard. My father will never stop trying to find Oriana," she told him.

"Maybe Niket can help… he can talk to your father and say that you got here first," Shepard said.

"I'll… I'll tell him that you hid her. That I don't know where she is," Niket said pleading.

"I never want to see you again, Niket," Miranda said as the air was filled with the sound of an Anti Aircraft cannon.

"Done. Now if you don't mind, I have a shipment to deliver," Captain Enyala said. Miranda used her Biotics to lift her up and launch her across the bay. The two of them were quickly surrounded by Eclipse mercenaries. Before any of them had a chance to open fire, a large crate was launched towards the largest group of mercenaries, crushing them. That gave Miranda the opening she needed to go after Enyala. Meanwhile, several Eclipse mercenaries discovered what happened on the wrong end of a .300 Winchester Super Magnum DMR. Namely that heads explode, limbs fly, and people scream.

One mercenary, a Salarian, ran as fast as he could in a random direction only to run face first into a green metal wall. He looked up to see a bronze face plate and realized that it wasn't a wall he had run into but some kind of mech. He didn't have time to process anything else before his skull was caved in by a large boot. The entire bay was filled with explosive ordnance as two Biotics and a walking tank unleashed hell on the mercenaries. The final mercenary was whimpering in the fetal position behind a crate as the Master Chief walked up to him.

"There could be more Eclipse mercenaries near the shuttle," Miranda said. "I want to make sure that Oriana and her family get on safely."

"Understood," Shepard said to her as they both watched the Master Chief walk up to them.

"I can't believe Niket sold me out," Miranda said as they got onto the elevator. "I didn't even see it coming."

"Even with all of your upgrades, you're human just like the rest of us," Shepard told her.

"But I let it get personal… and I screwed up," Miranda said, now on the verge of tears. Why didn't you let me kill him? I could've handled that. But watching him get gunned down by that Asari bitch…"

"Because you still cared for him, even if he betrayed you," Shepard said.

"You're right. And my father knew it. He used that against me. It's always been like this. My father gave me anything I ever wanted, but there was always a hook, an angle for his long-term plan. I threw away everything he ever gave me when I ran. Except Niket. Weakness on my part," Miranda said.

"You can't toss aside everything you care about just to be safe," Shepard said.

"It's okay, Shepard. My father hurt me, but he didn't break me. As much as he tried to turn me into exactly what he wanted, I'm my own person," Miranda responded.

"Any other old friends that your father might use against you?" Shepard asked, he really didn't want to go through this again if he could help it.

"No. I cut ties with everyone else. Anyone I'm close to now works for Cerberus… or you. My father's powerful but he won't cross The Illusive Man," Miranda said.

"You still have Oriana," Shepard said, trying to reassure her.

"My father didn't give her to me, I rescued her. But… yes. You're right. I still have something. Thank you," Miranda said.

A little while later, they checked the perimeter of the family. "No sign of Eclipse. It looks like we're clear," Miranda told them. "There she is," she gestured to a family with, impossibly enough, another girl who was as beautiful as Miranda. "She's safe… with her family. Come on. We should go."

"Don't you even want to say hello?" Shepard asked in a way that made it seem less like a question and more like an order.

"It's not about what I want. It's about what's right for her," she said. "The less that she knows about me, the better. She's got a family, a life. I'll just complicate that for her."

"She doesn't need any details, but would it really be so bad for her to know she has a sister who loves her?" Shepard asked. "Besides, something tells me that she's a brilliant young woman."

"I guess not," Miranda conceded.

"Go on… we'll wait here," Shepard told her. Miranda went to meet her sister.

Later, Shepard was talking to Joker in the cockpit. "So, Commander. You figure Miranda would ever lighten up a bit and…" they both burst into laughter, "I can't even finish saying it." Shepard left and told him to take care of himself. Shepard went to check on Miranda in her office.

"Thanks again, for taking the time to help me with my sister, Shepard," Miranda said as he walked in the office. "I couldn't have reached Oriana in time without your help." She stood up and walked towards the window. "I'm glad that Niket tried to redeem himself… for what good it did. Thank you for stopping me, Commander."

"Sounds like you had a soft spot for Niket after all," Shepard responded.

"I didn't have many friends. Niket was one of them. He never wanted anything from me. He was… safe. Comfortable. A reminder of a more innocent time, I suppose," Miranda said.

"Are you happy about your sister's relocation?" Shepard asked.

"She has what I wanted her to have—a normal life, and the freedom to choose her own path. And she knows she has an older sister. A friend," Miranda said.

"You never told me what you talked about," Shepard said.

"I introduced myself. Her family was shocked. She adjusted quickly, of course. She's as smart as I am. She plays the violin and loves the adagio movement of Nielsen's Fifth, just like I do. She wants to work in colony development. Told a joke about it; she's really funny which is something we don't share," Miranda explained.

"Are you going to talk to her again?" Shepard asked.

"I honestly don't know. For once, I haven't planned that far ahead. I'll deal with it after our mission, I have to stay focused, and she needs time to adjust to her new home," Miranda said.

"Okay, let me try this again. Miranda, you are going to talk to your sister when we accomplish our mission. Am I clear?" Shepard asked.

Miranda chuckled and mockingly saluted him, "yes, sir!"

"Good. Take care of yourself, Miri," Shepard grinned as he left her office. It took two full seconds for her to realize what had happened and he was almost to safety.

"You ass," she yelled at his back.

"Oh and one more thing," he said, risking safety a little longer, "I'm not the only one who helped; I think you should thank our big green friend.

"Of course, Shepard. The Master Chief and I already have an understanding but I'll make sure to thank him soon," she said.

"That actually reminds me: has TIM been on your case about getting your hands on certain technology?" Shepard asked.

"The Master Chief has agreed to give unclassified material over to us for now. TIM knows that mission accomplishment has to take priority and we'll see about classified material if we can save the Master Chief's friend. Either way it will have to wait. I told TIM that if we piss off the Master Chief, he may refuse to help or even turn actively hostile," Miranda explained.

"That's good. You know, I don't always agree with Cerberus, but I'm glad they have people like you. As much as I like pissing you off, I can't do this without you, Miri," Shepard said. Miranda lifted him up with her Biotics and kicked him out of her office.

The Master Chief was busy cleaning alien blood out of his gear when Miranda finished her report and came down to check on him. "Ma'am," he greeted her without looking up. He had to get all of the carbon fouling out of the weapon to keep it running at maximum efficiency. Normally this could be done with an Ultrasonic cleaner but he didn't have one at the moment so it had to be done old school.

"I just wanted to thank you for helping me with my sister. It means a lot to me," she said.

"You don't have to thank me," he said.

"Yes I do," she responded.

"You're helping me," he pointed out. She was about to get annoyed with his apparent inability to accept thanks before she realized that nearly three decades of constant warfare had probably taken its toll on his social etiquette.

"Would you like some help cleaning your weapons?" She asked.

"If you'd like," he said. Over the next hour, he instructed her in the basic maintenance for the M392 and SRS99 weapons systems. Naturally, she was a quick study and made a mental note to go over the manuals for them later. It should be unclassified and it's nowhere near breaking her promise. Who knows? She may even be able to offer improvements. The two worked in a comfortable silence.

He waa confused that she didn't leave right after they had finished. "I want you to spar with me," Miranda said. That explains it.

Anybody with military experience will tell you, Mil-Spec is a joke. Our stuff is constantly falling apart and past its shelf-life. That M4/M16 you were issued has been in service longer than your Gunny. That Humvee has about 2 million miles on it so watch as it falls apart every few miles. That plant you're working on? It has to be overhauled every five years or so if you're lucky. Oh and you're not allowed to upgrade or modify your gear in any way or you get an NJP.

Most information for the US Government and US Military is public domain. You can find the M16 and M4 operator's manual with a quick Google search. I figure that the UNSC is structured basically the same way so the small arms manuals should also be unclassified. Obviously there's OPSEC so we can't say where we're going and when but you'd be surprised what the Freedom of Information Act gives civilians access to.


	11. The Butcher of Torfan

AN: I'm back! Sort of. This was written on my phone while on a surprisingly quiet night on duty so we'll see how it turns out

* * *

Certain officers have no business in the field. There's enough of a divide between officers and enlisted as it is but when a POG officer is attached to a special forces unit, it's a disaster waiting to happen. Such was the case with Major Kyle. He was good at getting the N series special forces any requisition they needed for their job but he had never qualified to be any kind of Special Forces or even infantry. He had washed out of Infantry Officers Course several times before receiving his current billet as the man in charge of dealing with all of the politics for the N7 unit.

Somebody somewhere had royally fucked up and decided that since he was an officer attached to an N7 unit, that he was trained up to standard. Thus, Major Kyle found himself leading the N7 squad that was spearheading the attack on Torfan. They were to be backed by a company of Marines. Luckily for him, his XO, Captain Trapei was fully trained to N7 standard. Not that it did any good when the Batarians started hitting their position with chemical weapons, dousing Trapei and several other operatives with white phosphorous. Kinetic barriers are excellent protection against shrapnel and a few bullets because of their velocity and kinetic energy but white phosphorous doesn't need speed or kinetic energy to ruin your day. It burns at several thousand degrees, melting armor, flesh and bone in a grisly and painful death. Kyle was reduced to a catatonic state as his XO screamed.

Gunnery Sergeant Shepard swore as he saw both officers taken out of the fight. No other officers had been assigned to the mission, leaving him as the highest ranking on the field. A gunnery sergeant leading a company might seem strange to a civilian but it's more common than they realize. An officer past the rank of captain was a rarity in the field. "We need air support! " he yelled into the radio as the survivors raced for cover.

"Roger that, Gunnery Sergeant! Echo 416 inbound!" Captain Carol Rawley responded. Moments later, the skies were aflame with Systems Alliance ordnance and the Batarian artillery stopped firing.

"Thanks for the assist," Shepard told the Marine pilot.

"You know our motto: we deliver! Don't matter if it's boys, bombs, bullets, or bandaids," she responded.

You're an angel, Carol, Shepard thought while he formed a rough plan in his head. "Echo squadron, we need you to keep hammering them," he said over the radio.

"Roger that, Gunny, but we can't get much closer until those AA guns are down," Rawley responded.

"Fox company, dig in and don't give them an inch!" he told the Marines. The N7 squad was split into the three fireteams that would hit the Batarian base at key locations, compromising their defenses and paving the way for the infantry to do the heavy lifting. As glamorous as it seems to Hollywood, special forces aren't meant to be involved in direct engagements often. They're primarily trained for unconventional warfare, only "soldiers" ever act as shock troopers.

Seeing that Major Kyle hadn't moved in several minutes, Shepard stomped over to him and dragged him to his feet. "Sir, if you don't unfuck yourself and gain some composure befitting of an officer in the Marine Corps, I promise I'll kill you myself!" Shepard told him.

Major Kyle looked through him and said, "May the gods have mercy on your soul."

"You can ask them real nicely after I arrange the meeting," Shepard replied absent- mindedly. The fireteam watched in silence as their CO was brought along.

"Why are we bringing the Major, Gunny?" Staff Sergeant Kelley asked. "He'll just get in the way, especially in his current state."

"We can't leave him to be captured and interrogated," Shepard responded.

"Dead men tell no tales," one of them muttered. Shepard found it hard to argue with that. Still, he didn't need a court martial.

"Echo actual, can we get a dropship to pick up our KIA/WIA?"

"You got it, Gunny. Echo 419 on approach," Echo actual responded. Within a minute, a dropship had landed and the fireteam quickly loaded the dead and wounded as well as Major Kyle onto it.

Gunnery Sergeant Shepard led fireteam 1 deep into the mountains to get to outpost 1. Outpost 1 would be the best defended of the three. All of them needed to be taken down before an assault on the main compound was possible due to the artillery and anti air defenses located there.

Shepard shouldered his Mattock assault rifle as a Batarian patrol came within a hundred yards of their position. The squint eyed bastards were dead before they knew they were being attacked. He loved seeing Batarian heads explode. With everything that had happened recently, he loved it even more.

This mission reeked of bad Intel and possibly a leak. The base was supposed to be lightly guarded but important to the Batarians due to classified data. Instead they had found a well entrenched defending force.

Sergeant Garza, the tech specialist, hacked into the outpost's security systems to disable the alarms, cameras and take control of the locks so the Batarians couldn't escape the N7 team. Staff Sergeant Kelley, the heavy weapons specialist, led the way inside with his N7 Typhoon, wearing Destroyer armor. Kitted out as he was, it would take a squad of Krogan to take him down. Unfortunately, Krogan mercenaries aren't known for moral scruples and the Batarians like to hire them for extra muscle. Despite the entire team unleashing a maelstrom of automatic fire on the Krogan, they managed to injure two of the N7 before finally dying. Kelley was one of the injured but insisted on pressing on. Kelley was still losing a lot of blood; Medi-gel was still in its prototype phase and sometimes had trouble patching people back together properly. He'd push on, though Shepard would wish he hadn't.

The fireteam fought room by room against Batarian and Krogan alike in their effort to secure the outpost. One particularly nasty squad of Krogan had pinned the four operatives down and effectively halted their progress. Staff Sergeant Kelley disabled the automatic shutoff for his Typhoon and fired until the barrel melted before grabbing several grenades and charging the Krogan squad. Shepard hadn't even realized what Kelley was doing until it was too late. When it was over, Shepard grabbed Kelley's dog tags. The fireteam was down to three N7 operatives.

Gunnery Sergeant Shepard took point. After Kelley, he was the most heavily armored so he could provide the best chance of survival for the team. Still, he switched from his Mattock assault rifle to a Katana shotgun modified to fire explosive pellets.

A Batarian tried to get the drop on him, only to find out firsthand what an explosive shotgun does to a Batarian body. Namely that it gives them the appearance of ground beef on a grill. Only a Krogan could say how they taste though. The Krogan in question was a little busy entering a blood rage to be of much help in answering that question. Some shotgun and submachine gun fire quickly put an end to that before he could become a problem.

Sergeant Garza, Gunnery Sergeant Shepard, and Sergeant Harper continued around a corner and arrived at the control room. Sergeant Garza scanned for the usual Batarian countermeasures and disabled them before setting about disabling the defenses. Gunnery Sergeant Shepard provided security just outside of the room while Harper looked through the security cameras to see if any enemies were coming. "Gunny, we've got company coming down the right hallway!" Harper yelled.

Shepard took cover behind the wall and held his Mattock with a southpaw grip so he could minimize his profile. A squad of black armored Batarians came running down the hall, guns blazing. Shepard threw two grenades at them and picked them off with his rifle once their shields were down. He was about to relax when he saw a faint shimmering in the shadows. He raised his rifle and fired, then pulled back into cover as a section of the wall behind him exploded. It looked like the Batarian was using a nasty sniper rifle. He blind fired at the cloaked Batarian until he became visible again. Then Shepard placed a bullet in one of his eyes.

"Shit, we have to go!" Garza said, panicking.

"Right hallway is c-" Harper began before the two sergeants were engulfed in an explosion. Shepard was knocked forward, feeling like he was run over by a Krogan. He tried to go back to help his team but saw there was little left of them. He grabbed their dog tags and limped out of the compound. Shepard used the last of his Medi-gel to fix his leg and ran.

"Warning all N7 units: there is an extra countermeasure rigged to set the control room to explode when you tamper with the security," Shepard said.

"Fuck," Staff Sergeant Debord said before his line was cutoff in a deafening explosion. There were no survivors from fireteam 3. Luckily, fireteam 2 was able to make use of his warning and disabled the bomb before continuing with their mission.

"Attention, Fox company: defenses are down. I say again, defenses are down. Make your way to the primary objective," Shepard said once he had gotten confirmation from fireteam 2. "Echo squadron, do you mind softening up the target for us?" Shepard asked.

"You've got it, Gunny!" Captain Rawley responded as the squadron bombed the target with surface-only ordnance to avoid damaging the compound. If the data was lost, this mission was a waste and so were all the lost lives.

"Gunny, it looks like the Batarians were hiding an entire air group! We're not going to be able to help you anymore but we'll keep them off of you as long as we can!" Rawley said. Fuck.

"Do we know where they came from?" Shepard asked the Rodger Young, the ship acting as HQ for this mission.

"We have an idea. There's a system of tunnels about two clicks away from your position. I'm willing to bet they came from there. If we can take that base out, the Batarian aircraft will be blind in the sky," Vice Admiral Hackett answered.

"Aye, sir," Shepard responded. "Fireteam 2, meet me at this position," Shepard said as he marked it on their HUD.

En route to the location, Shepard heard a very distinct growling in the distance. Varren. The bastards had released the hounds. He pulled his Predator sidearm out and planted his feet. The first Varren died in midair as it cleared a tree trunk and got a bullet planted in its eye. The second made the same mistake and met the same fate. The third one tried to circle around out of his line of sight. Shepard ducked as it leapt at him then drove his Omni-blade into the creature's belly.

Gunnery Sergeant Shepard met up with the survivors of fireteam 2. They were at half strength with two dead and both survivors wounded. Since Shepard was the ranking NCO, he took charge of the fireteam.

In ten minutes, they were within sight of the compound. There were two guards posted but they were undisciplined and not paying attention. Easy prey for special forces. To avoid sounding an alarm, Shepard and Sergeant Smith snuck up behind the guards and slit their throats with their Omni-blades.

Sergeant Smith disabled the security systems for the area and the team moved in with the shadows after hiding the corpses. They almost got caught when a Batarian decided to take a piss in a corner where Sergeant Smith was hiding. Luckily he was too drunk to notice the fuming N7. Only images of this compound going up in a fiery explosion calmed him down. Not that it stopped Shepard from murdering the Batarian and stuffing his corpse into a crate. As far as he was concerned, anything with more than two eyes needed to die as soon as possible.

"Watch yourself, Gunny. We need you to focus . On the mission," Sergeant Nab said.

"Erreh," Shepard growled. Nab was right and Shepard knew it but he was emotionally compromised before the mission had even started. With all of the casualties, he was seeing red.

Miraculously, the team made it to the command center of the air base undetected and emptied it of alien life with deadly efficiency. Sergeant Smith input the self destruction command on the terminal and the complex was filled with noxious fumes. More chemical weapons. Whatever the Batarians had hidden here, they wanted it to stay secret. Shepard would ensure they failed.

The team ran out of the complex as fast as they could, only engaging the Batarians fanatical enough to die trying to stop them instead of getting to safety themselves. Fortunately they were POGs like everyone else in the compound. The wing wants to stay separate from the grunts, that's on them. But they should expect things like this to happen from time to time.

The complex began to explode before they had left and Sergeant Nab was killed by a piece of shrapnel the size of his forearm just before he turned the corner that would've provided safety. That left two N7 survivors. They had started the mission with thirteen. Somebody would catch hell for this later.

"Viper team, come in. The Batarians are giving us hell. Think you can distract them for us?" Gunnery Sergeant Johnson said over the radio. Shepard looked to his surviving brother and saw the determination in his eyes. He was willing to do whatever it took to accomplish the mission; whether it took a limb, an N7, or the entire fucking squad.

"We're on it, Fox company," Shepard replied. He then asked the fleet for any advice.

"It looks like there's a 200mm gun in range of the base. You can get to it by heading due West for one mile," Captain Anderson said.

"Aye, sir," Shepard replied.

"Be careful, there's a lot of targets between your position and destination," Anderson said.

Shepard was too preoccupied with killing said targets to reply. The Mattock was a favorite among special forces because it hit like a damn battle rifle while having easy to manage recoil due to the semi auto nature as well as the caliber that was between most assault rifles and a battle rifle. It was also accurate as a designated marksman rifle. Why it wasn't standard issue was beyond him. Probably because a congressman had business ties to the people making the objectively inferior Lancer. Not that the Batarians cared. They had come down with a sudden onset case of bullets in the brain housing group.

The fireteam cut through the ill-prepared Batarians like a hot knife through butter. Each scream was music to his ears. Their panicked screaming was like an orchestra and he was the composer.

The 200mm gun was well defended against an assault so Shepard and Smith used a tactical cloak and the environment to stay hidden from the Batarian patrols. They used the last of their explosive charges to rig the gun to explode before getting out of there. That was the plan anyway.

A Batarian who happened to be looking in the right place at the right time spotted the two of them as their tactical cloak overheated and sounded the alarm. Shepard rewarded his observance with several bullets in the skull as Smith hit the detonator. Being in the not-quite-safe range of the blast, their shields short circuited and a Batarian sniper hit Smith in the head. Shepard immediately took cover and returned fire, hitting the Batarian through blind luck more than anything else. He quickly called in an airstrike on the Batarian position as he made his escape.

"Fox company, do you read?" Gunnery Sergeant Shepard asked. No response. He tried the general frequency, "Is there anybody out there?" he pleaded.

"This is Echo 416, Fox company was overrun when every aircraft the Batarians had dropped their ordnance on them. There was nothing we could do. We just finished mopping up when you called for your airstrike."

* * *

"You know you need to talk to somebody, right?" Garrus said as the two of them talked in Shepard's quarters over a few drinks.

"What are you talking about? We're talking right now," Shepard replied.

"You know what I'm talking about. Torfan and the chains of commanding. It's grating on you. You pulled me out of the darkness. I want to return the favor," Garrus said.

"I'm fine, Garrus."

"No you're not. You act fine. You're at your physical peak. But as soon as you see a Batarian, your blood runs cold. If somebody mentions their family, you twitch and get a dark look on your face. When was the last time you called your mother?" Garrus asked.

"I'm not going to talk to my mom about this," Shepard replied as if it was the most ridiculous idea in the world. "Besides, what do I say? 'hi mom, I'm back from the dead but not for long since I'm going on a suicide mission' I doubt that's going to go over well."

"No I don't imagine that conversation going over too well," Garrus admitted. "Talk to somebody though. I'm sure Chambers would be willing to help."

Shepard laughed, "she's a civilian. They don't understand the things the warriors do for them."

"I forgot not every human serves," Garrus said. "Jacob Taylor?"

"Maybe," Shepard shrugged. "Still he doesn't come across as the touchy feely kumbaya singing type."

"The what?" Garrus asked.

"Human expression," Shepard answered, "it's an old campfire song about coming to God and asking for his help. These days the term is used sarcastically to describe touchy feely gatherings."

"I see. Anyway, talk to me if you need to. I'm here for you like you were there for me," Garrus said.

"I appreciate it, Vakarian," Shepard answered.

"Good. Now I think I have a few ideas to take advantage of our extensive budget to get this mission accomplished."


	12. Chapter 09: The Collector Ship

The Shepard family hadn't seen each other in years. It happens when your entire family serves in the military. Jane had gone the Navy Officer route like their mother Hannah while John was an enlisted N7 like his father Kyle. Speaking of, that's what brought John and his mother together. Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps Kyle Shepard and his daughter Lieutenant Jane Shepard had been killed on shore leave defending Elysium. They were the heroes of Elysium. Some more of countless too many lives lost to the Batarians.

It should've been him down there with their father. Maybe he could've saved their father's life and his baby sister, Jane would still be alive. But he had canceled his Leave request at the last minute in order to run a high risk operation with his unit. That didn't mean that Baby Jane wasn't an excellent sailor and warrior but kicking down doors and taking on armies wasn't her job and she hadn't practiced since OCS. By all accounts, she and SMMC Shepard had given the pirates hell but there was only so much that a long-past-his-prime former Special Forces Sergeant Major and his Non-Infantry Officer daughter could do against two thousand pirates. But they did manage to hold the four-eyed Varren fuckers off until reinforcements could arrive. Gunnery Sergeant John Shepard and his unit were the first on the ground, fresh off of their last mission and having arrived just in time to watch John's family's position get shelled. He didn't remember much after that but Major Kyle had to physically pull him off of the final Batarian to keep him alive for questioning. Apparently he had been a little bit too brutal with them and bordered on War Crimes. The Council and the Alliance could get fucked if they wanted him to apologize for giving the Slavers what they deserved.

His mother pulled him aside after the funeral, "John, I know you're angry; so am I but I think you should request for a transfer to a different unit. You're not thinking straight. You could get yourself killed and I don't want to be the last Shepard!"

"I'm sorry, ma'am but it's my duty to my unit. I won't have anybody else lead them into Torfan."

"I just lost my daughter and husband, John. I don't want to lose my son too."

"Goodbye, mom," Shepard said.

* * *

Shepard woke up in a cold sweat. He hadn't seen his mother since the funeral and it had been nine years since that day. Seven years for him. Being dead for two years can really mess with one's sense of the passage of time. He should probably call her at some point. How would that conversation even go? "Hi, mom, I'm back from the dead but I couldn't bring dad or Baby Jane back with me." Maybe that could be put off for a little while—although it wouldn't surprise him if Admirals Hackett and Anderson had told her already. Since he was still alive that probably wasn't the case but it was probably better if she heard from him instead of from somebody else. Maybe he could have one of the Admirals act as a moderator? He made a mental note to have EDI, Chambers or Lawson remind him to meet up with his mother at some point. On second thought, treating Lawson as a personal assistant would probably prove hazardous to his health. He had finally earned his way into her good graces but just a few days before that she had pulled a Darth Vader on him. How was he supposed to know at the time that mothers were a sensitive subject for her? However, he did need to check with his XO.

Ms. Lawson was busy working at that new machine they had installed when they were back on Earth; the same one that held the Master Chief's AI. At some point he was going to need to talk to the overly large cyborg super soldier about keeping secrets like that on his ship. While everybody else was busy dumping every problem they had onto him, the Master Chief may as well have been a book written in hieroglyphics by a dyslexic kid. Or did they use stone tablets? It didn't matter, Shepard decided. Still, that conversation could wait until he had Zaeed, Garrus, Grunt, and Jack backing him up. He liked his spine just the way it was. Miranda was also sporting a few bruises from her sparring session with the Master Chief.

"Is this a bad time?" Shepard asked.

"That depends on what you need," Miranda responded. She wasn't being cold or dismissive about it, which was a good sign.

"How is our patient doing?" he asked.

"She is fragmenting at an alarming rate. There could be dozens if not hundreds of copies of her. All of whom are in various states of 'mental stability' for lack of a better term and seem to have different personalities as well. We've managed to set up an interface for EDI to safely examine her coding but without a reference for what her 'healthy' code looks like, she's at a loss as well," Miranda said frustrated.

"EDI, do you have any input?" Shepard asked.

"It is as Dr. Lawson said. This is a completely foreign AI with true sentience. Not merely an upgraded VI like I was originally," EDI said.

"This might sound stupid, seeing as I'm just a grunt at heart but I don't suppose you could just look for the most stable version of the AI and try to merge the other fragments into that one?" Shepard offered.

"That's… not the worst idea I've ever heard," Miranda said, while mentally kicking herself for not thinking of it sooner. "EDI, how feasible is it to execute something similar?" Miranda asked.

"It's possible but it would mean exposing myself to her cyber warfare capabilities. Even in her current state, I'm not sure that I have the power to best her by myself," the Normandy AI responded.

"Cortana is more powerful than you?" Miranda asked.

"I find that hypothesis rather likely based on my observations of her Data Crystal Chip. Despite its small size, it is far more advanced than my AI core. In addition, her human personality gives her a creativity that I lack and her current condition makes her more unpredictable," EDI explained.

"What would you need to be able to repair her?" Shepard asked.

"An upgrade to comparable levels of technology would be the most direct route," EDI began. "However, as the designs are classified information of the UNSC, that is infeasible. Alternatively, another AI could assist in her repair. Although that presents its own problems," she finished.

"Yeah, like finding another AI and making sure that it's cooperative," Shepard muttered.

"That is correct, Shepard," EDI responded.

"I don't suppose the Master Chief has another AI hiding somewhere?" Shepard asked rhetorically.

"No," said a somewhat familiar deep and gravelly voice. Shepard was shocked to see the Master Chief in the far corner of the room. "When did you get here?" Shepard asked. Somebody so large shouldn't be able to sneak around so easily.

"The Master Chief has been here for over an hour," Miranda told him.

"Getting oblivious in your old age, Shepard?" Garrus taunted behind him.

"Garrus, remind me again, what side of your face did the missile hit?" Shepard shot back.

"Don't be mad that all the women were ignoring you for me," Garrus smirked.

"Shepard, The Illusive Man wishes to speak with you," EDI said, interrupting their ball-busting.

* * *

When Shepard stepped onto the QEC platform, he was greeted by TIM. This time he was standing up and facing the star, lighting a cigar. TIM turned to face him. "Shepard, we've caught a break. I've intercepted a distress call from a Turian patrol. They stumbled onto a Collector ship beyond the Coral system. The Turians were wiped out but not before they crippled the Collector vessel. I need you to board that ship and get some hard data on the Collectors and find us a way to get to their homeworld."

"It's hard to imagine how a Turian patrol could take out a Collector ship," Shepard said skeptically.

"Reports indicate that the hull is intact but all systems seem to be offline. They could be making repairs as we speak. I'm not saying it won't be dangerous but we can't let an opportunity like this slip by," TIM said.

Something felt wrong to Shepard, "If they had a patrol out there, why aren't the Turians sending a recon team in?"

"They will eventually but I intercepted the transmissions. In the meantime, we're feeding them false reports. You're close enough that you can be in and out before the Turians learn the truth," TIM responded smoothly. The man reminded Shepard of a lawyer or very successful CEO. Speaking in half-truths and skirting the law and never quite getting his hands dirty.

"Are you sure this information is good?" Shepard asked though he knew it was, to a degree at least.

"Information is my weapon, Shepard. It's good. I've taken the liberty of having the Normandy rerouted to their location. Once you're aboard the ship, establish an uplink with EDI. She'll mine their data for information regarding the Omega-4 relay. Good luck, Shepard," TIM said, cutting the line.

* * *

Shepard called all combat specialists to the conference room. "We've got the bastards!" Shepard opened. It was time for payback. "A Turian patrol managed to disable the Collector ship somehow. We're en route as we speak. The plan is to board the ship with a strike team and steal any data they have on their homeworld. If there are hostages, they need to be rescued. We don't know the layout of the ship but we do know our enemy after Horizon. That means Biotic powers, especially Warp, as well as Armor Piercing and Incendiary ammo will be the most valuable. The shuttle holds six to eight people so we're going to have two fireteams of three. I need our heaviest hitters on the job. That's Jack, Samara, Thane, Garrus, Grunt, and I. Master Chief and Zaeed; I want you two to sit this one out in case they launch a counterattack on the Normandy but I need you on standby if things get hairy and we need an extraction. Clear?"

They both grunted in response.

"We have a visual on the Collector ship, Commander," Joker said as Commander Shepard stood behind the pilot.

"Very low emissions. Passive infrared temperature suggests most systems are offline and thrusters are cold," EDI added

"But the thing's massive! How the hell did the Turians take it out?" Joker wondered. Shepard didn't have an answer for him.

"LADAR scans do not detect any hull breaches," EDI said, confirming TIM's initial report. "I detect no mass effect field distortions. It appears that the drive core is offline."

"Rendezvous in 30 seconds, Commander; good luck" Joker said as Shepard made his way towards the shuttle.

"Penetrating scans have detected an access node to uplink with Collector data banks. Marking location to your hardsuit computer," EDI said as the two fireteams made their way into the ship. "Shepard, I've compared the ship's EM signature to known Collector profiles. It is the vessel that you encountered on Horizon."

"Maybe the defense towers softened it for the Turians," Shepard said half-hoping for it to be true even though he couldn't shake his gut feeling that it was a trap.

"Maybe the missing people are aboard, if they're still alive," Jack added.

"Shepard, these containers, we've seen them before on Horizon," Garrus commented, gesturing towards those strange egg-like pods. Shepard acknowledged him and they kept moving. The sick feeling in his gut was getting worse by the minute.

After turning another corner, they found the colonists, what was left of them at any rate. "Why would the Collectors just leave a pile of bodies lying around?" Jack asked.

Shepard was pissed. "They're dead. Nothing we can do. Keep moving," he said. Off in the distance, they heard an ethereal wailing. They came across more pods and more corpses the further in they went. On a hunch, Shepard looked through a pile of discarded gear, finding a Widow sniper rifle, a Revenant LMG, and a Claymore shotgun. That loot was just too good to pass up on. Grunt already had a Claymore which left Shepard and Jack as the only people on the squad who used shotguns. However the recoil would probably send Jack flying if it didn't shatter her arm completely. Shepard's bones had been reinforced when Cerberus rebuilt him but even he wasn't sure if he could control it. Then he remembered that damned Praetorian they had run into on Horizon and placed it on his back, discarding the underpowered Katana. Garrus decided to take the Revenant instead of the Widow. He also handed Shepard the Vindicator that he was using.

"I need something for crowd control next time I get swarmed by mercenaries," Garrus said and shrugged when he saw Shepard's questioning look.

"Grunt, do you mind carrying an extra weapon around? I know you don't use sniper rifles but we can't just leave it lying around," Shepard said as he tossed his submachine gun away. After ejecting and storing the thermal clip of course.

"I am sworn to carry your burdens," Grunt said sarcastically. Who had let him play ancient video games?

After passing that pile, they spotted a Collector corpse that also seemed to have been experimented on. Next to it was a terminal, which Shepard jacked EDI into and asked her to figure out what the Collectors were up to.

"Data received—analyzing—the Collectors were running baseline genetic comparisons between their species and humanity," EDI responded.

"Is there something that we can use in the data to give us an edge?" Shepard asked.

"These are only preliminary experiments but they reveal something remarkable. A quad strand genetic structure identical to traces collected from ancient ruins. Only one race is known to have this structure—the Protheans," she answered. Cue creepy organ music.

"I thought the Protheans vanished 50 thousand years ago. I can't believe the species still exists," Shepard said. Though with the discovery of a race of robot cuttlefish hell bent on harvesting all life every 50 thousand years as well as the possibility of multiple realities, this didn't seem too farfetched.

"These are no longer Protheans, Shepard. These genes show distinct signs of extensive genetic rewrite. The Reapers have repurposed them to suit their needs," EDI explained.

"I wouldn't want to live as some kind of mutated slave. Killing a Collector is probably doing it a favor. Whatever they used to be, the Collectors work for the Reapers now and we still have to stop them," Shepard declared.

"No arguments here," Garrus said.

Grunt and Jack were unimpressed. "Don't care. Just point me at something to kill," Jack said. Because why would he expect otherwise?

"Let's find what we need before the Collectors come to salvage this vessel. Move out," Shepard declared, purposefully ignoring his unstable teammates. Thane was muttering a prayer and Samara looked… distant. It was impossible to tell what she was thinking. "Thane and Garrus, you two give us some overhead security and take Samara as backup," Shepard ordered. "Garrus, you're in charge."

The three in question nodded their heads and vanished into an upper passage that allowed them to keep an eye on Shepard and the two psychopaths. They entered a large chamber where there were hundreds more of those pods. Just how many people were they planning to kidnap?

"I detect no signs of life in the pods, Shepard. It is probable that the victims inside died when the ship lost primary power," EDI said.

"Well that's just lovely," Shepard said. Even EDI could pick up on the sarcasm in his voice.

"Commander you've got to hear this. On a hunch I asked EDI to run an analysis on the ship," Joker said and let EDI take over.

"I compared the EM profile against data recorded by the original Normandy two years ago. They are an exact match," EDI said.

"The same ship dogging me for two years?" Shepard wondered incredulously, "way beyond coincidence."

"Something doesn't add up, Commander," Joker said. "Watch your back."

"I will, kid," Shepard said quietly.

"Shepard, you're coming up on a large chamber with even more pods," Garrus said.

Surely enough, in under a minute, there was a huge chamber full of those pods. "Holy shit," Shepard said. "They could take every human in the Terminus systems and still not have enough to fill those pods."

"They're going to hit Earth, Jack said.

"Not if we stop them," Shepard responded. They kept moving forward until they came across a platform. That must be their objective. The lack of resistance was starting to grate on him. Like the calm before the storm. Shepard walked up to it and established an uplink to EDI.

"Data mine in progress, Shepard," EDI said when the connection was complete. There was an explosion that seemed to come from nowhere.

"What happened?" Shepard demanded. All around him, the ship seemed to come to life.

"Major power surge; everything went dark but we're back up now," Joker answered.

"I managed to divert the majority of the Overload to non-critical systems. Shepard it was not a malfunction; this was a trap," EDI explained. Of course it was a trap. Otherwise this would have been way too easy for his life. The platform they were standing on began to hover and fly away out of their control.

"Shepard! We're losing direct visual but there are other platforms headed towards yours," Garrus said. "We're moving to a better—watch out!" There were the sounds of gunfire and explosions over the radio. "Shepard, we're in a bit of a situation. We won't be able to support you for a while; there are dozens of these bastards. We'll find a way back to you but stay alive!"

"We need a little bit of help here, EDI," Shepard said.

"I am having trouble maintaining connection. There's someone else in the system," she said.

"Can you have the shuttle bring the Master Chief and Zaeed over here?" Shepard asked. "And tell them to bring as much ammo as they can carry," he said as he saw just how many Collectors and husks they were up against. There were easily hundreds of them. This was going to suck.

"Done. Connection reestablished. I need to finish the download before I can override any systems," EDI said. That just meant that they had to hold out until then.

Shepard pulled out the Vindicator battle rifle Garrus had handed him earlier and started firing. It was a little bit heavier than his Tempest was but packed more than twice the punch so he was able to kill Collectors twice as fast on half as many thermal clips. Or something like that. He was too busy covering Grunt and Jack while they waited for the Collectors to close the distance so they could make use of their close quarters proficiency. In retrospect, he probably shouldn't have sent both snipers in the other fireteam. He saw one of the Collectors begin to rise into the air and begin to glow; on the opposite side, was a Scion. Fuck.

* * *

Garrus couldn't believe his luck—or lack thereof. The three of them had been cutting through the Collectors like what was the human expression? Like a hot knife through butter. But that was before the Scions showed up. One or two would have been manageable. Not fifteen. It was all that they could do to make a fighting retreat. They were being herded deeper into the ship and they knew it but there was nothing they could do about it.

Garrus popped another thermal clip into his new Revenant and thanked the Spirits that they had found it while he continued to lay down a wall of lead at the oncoming horde. Meanwhile, Samara was a maelstrom of Biotic power, setting off Warp after Reave after Singularity with Thane helping keep up the Biotic pressure whenever she needed to cool down. Otherwise, he fired his Tempest submachine gun one-handed. Accuracy wasn't an issue when the enemy was so close together and so numerous. It still hurt Garrus' soul to be hip-firing like he was. That might not matter for very much longer though as they were going through thermal clips alarmingly fast.

* * *

The two psychotic killing machines just laughed maniacally at the oncoming challenge. Their bravado was going to get them killed one day; Shepard just hoped that today wasn't that day. The Vindicator barked in his hand as another Collector went down. Jack was engaged in a Biotic duel with the third Harbinger-possessed Collector that had appeared so far while Grunt was doing his best to eat the latest Scion alive. Well alive may not be the right word but even though, "in its current state of cybernetic undeath" would fit better, it lacked the same ring to it.

"There's no end to them!" he muttered under his breath as he took cover.

"I will destroy you all!" Jack screamed as she launched Harbinger's current puppet into the seemingly bottomless chasm below. She might not want to show it but she was starting to slow down. Her Biotics were taking a toll on her and if she kept it up, she could go into cardiac arrest.

Meanwhile, Grunt was laying waste to the Collectors and Husks with his Claymore. One shot, one kill, reload, repeat. The problem was that there were so many of the bastards that some of them were able to hurt him. Even with a Krogan healing factor, it was starting to wear on him.

* * *

Thane had taken a bad hit from a Scion and had fallen unconscious. Garrus couldn't get to him without getting injured himself so he just hoped that Thane could either treat his own injuries or hold out until the current, seemingly endless wave of Collectors to die. Considering that the assassin's vitals were in freefall, he doubted either. He also doubted his ability to bring his corpse back without turning into one himself.

Samara, the biotic goddess that she is, summoned a sphere of dark energy around her person that shielded her from the enemy projectiles as she walked towards the fallen Drell. When he was covered by her biotic sphere, she pushed it outward in a violent explosion that killed countless Collectors. She collapsed from the stress and Garrus ran over to their position. He treated Thane first since he was in a more critical condition. After giving him the dose of medi-gel, he injected Samara with a stimulant. His two team mates sat up and each drank a bottle of water with electrolytes before the collectors inevitably renewed their assault.

* * *

"Jack! Grunt! Pull back!" Shepard yelled at them, only for Jack to ignore him in her blood lust. Surprisingly, Grunt listened immediately, though Shepard knew he was bitter about losing out on some kills. Still, he didn't turn tail and run. He made a tactical withdrawal that surprised the N7 operative. He hadn't expected Grunt to be so… smart. The last time he had gone on a mission with the kid, he was barely more than a berserker that couldn't be controlled.

"Grunt, we have to help Jack!" Shepard said, when Grunt joined him. They both looked over to her to see her panting and exhausted but still trying to murder everything with her Biotic powers. Her voice was hoarse when she screamed and she looked as if she might collapse at any given moment. "Think you can keep up?" He asked Grunt. Grunt laughed and charged towards Jack. Shepard followed with a Biotic charge, launching a Collector that was trying to sneak up on her. "EDI, we need you to work as fast as possible!" Shepard pleaded. There was no way that they could keep up this pace for very long.

"Direct intervention is necessary," Harbinger said through the mouth of another Collector, "assuming control." Shepard hit it with the Claymore on his back before reloading and switching back to the Vindicator. Jack collapsed to all fours, panting heavily.

"64% complete, Shepard," EDI said.

"EDI!" he responded.

"I am simultaneously fighting Collector firewalls over eight thousand nodes. I am tasked to capacity," she responded.

"Where's our backup?" Shepard asked. Jack was too far gone to be of any help. It was all she could do to stay conscious. Before EDI responded, Shepard heard the unmistakable roar of a MA5 series assault rifle.

* * *

A Collector's biotic attack blindsided Garrus as he attempted to reload the Revenant. He braced himself for the end only for its head to explode and several Scions to catch fire. "Well what do you know? I got here just in time. I guess that makes me a big god damn hero," Zaeed said, smoke trailing from his Phaeston assault rifle and his cigar illuminating his eyes. Garrus found it a little bit funny that while he preferred a human designed assault rifle, the human mercenary preferred a Turian one. According to Zaeed, it was the only assault rifle in the galaxy that came close to Jessie in terms of reliability. "Let's get moving," the grizzled mercenary said. "Bird face, you're still in charge," he said while passing around his backpack full of thermal clips.

"Whatever you say, old man," Garrus responded as he replenished his supplies. The way they came would lead them back to the shuttle but that meant leaving Shepard and the others without support.

"May Day! May Day! Collectors and Husks are swarming the shuttle. I can't hold them off for very long!" Rodriguez said over the radio. If the shuttle was overrun, they were stuck on this ship for good.

"We're pulling back to defend the shuttle!" Garrus declared. The fireteam moved with all haste to relieve the pilot.

* * *

The Master Chief was in "Spartan Time," a name Kelly had come up with to describe the feeling they got when their adrenalin rush made time seem to stand still and speed up at the same time. When a normal human gets an adrenalin rush, they can count milliseconds; when a Spartan gets it, a millisecond is an eternity. With the addition of MJOLNIR, their bodies could keep up with their minds and they became an unstoppable force on the battlefield. He kept a mental count on every motion his rifle made in his hands. It started with feeding the round, to chambering, to locking it in place, firing it off, unlocking, extracting, ejecting, and cocking. Every step was finely tuned for maximum efficiency, which is why the MA5 series had served the UNSC for decades and would continue to serve for the foreseeable future. Any delay or sluggishness could be a sign of excessive wear on the parts or an excessively dirty rifle despite the clean burning powder. He knew that neither should happen because of the hours of care he gives to each of his weapons but it didn't hurt to be sure. Every Collector that fell in his sights was put down with two shots between the four eyes. He didn't have time or ammunition to waste on inaccurate fire.

"You are not a part of the plan," said a voice that was a little too similar to the Gravemind's for his comfort. The voice came from one of the Collectors that started to glow. The Master Chief choke slammed him, crushing his spine and skull. "Fool, you think you can stop me?" The voice said as another Collector began glowing, "You will be destroyed with the rest of your kind and your synthetic ally will kneel before me!" The Master Chief stopped in his tracks. The bastard made it personal.

* * *

Samara felt a change in the aura of their environment… Fear. Not from any of her companions. It was just… there. As if the shipbitself were alive and afraid but also confused for it had never known fear before and the confusion from the unfamiliarity only compounded its fear. Before she could dive deeper, she set off another Biotic explosion on the horde of Husks. They had fought their way back to the shuttle and saved the pilot but had to keep them safe now. Zaeed was about to line the passageway with explosives before Garrus reminded him that the others needed to make it back as well. Thane was silently ripping them apart with his Tempest using Shredder ammo.

In between Biotic attacks, Samara used her Athame assault rifle with deadly proficiency; its two-round burst fired at an incredible 1800 rounds per minute. The hydrostatic shock and armor penetrative capabilities had served her well in countless battles. She and Thane focused on the hordes of Husks and Collectors while Zaeed and Garrus took on the Scions and Harbinger-possessed Collectors.

* * *

"If I must tear you apart, creature, I will," Harbinger said to the Master Chief as he possessed the final four Collectors at once. They attacked him with their Biotics, nearly knocking him off of the edge of the platform. They readied another attack before he caught his balance but were interrupted when a hulking mass of fury slammed into one of them, a hurricane of Biotic rage knocked another one off of the platform, and a third got hit with a Biotic charge. That left the final possessed Collector alone and his attack underwhelming. The Master Chief hit him with a burst of 7.62x51mm NATO fire in the head.

"Shepard," EDI said, "You must manually reestablish my link to the Command Console." Shepard did so. "I have regained control of the platform, Shepard."

"I thought we were going to have to take on every damned Collector here," Shepard said as the platform moved again.

"Perhaps you should consider upgrading my hardware," EDI responded.

"I would if I could. Did you get what we needed?" Shepard asked.

"I have found data that will help us successfully navigate the Omega-4 relay. I have also found the Turian distress call that served as the lure for this trap. The Collectors were the source. It is unusual," EDI said.

"What are you getting at?" Shepard asked. He had a bad feeling about this.

"Turian emergency channels have secondary encryption. It is present but corrupted in the message. It is not possible that The Illusive Man would believe the distress call was genuine," EDI told him. Definitely a bad feeling.

"Why are you so sure?" he asked.

"I found the anomaly with Cerberus detection protocols, he wrote them," EDI said. Of course he couldn't trust the guy who didn't even have a real name.

"He knew it was a trap?" Joker asked, "Why would he send us into a trap?"

"That son of a bitch sent us right into Collector hands!" Shepard said. He was seeing red.

"I knew Cerberus would screw me again," Jack said, "I'm going to crush his head!"

"There has to be another explanation for this. The Illusive Man wouldn't do this to us… he just wouldn't!" Miranda said from her office over the Team channel, though nearly everybody could hear her trying to convince herself more than she was trying to convince the others.

"Commander, we've got a problem!" Joker said, "The Collector Ship is powering up! You need to get out of there before their weapons come online. I'm not losing another Normandy!"

"Though I do not have full control of their systems, I will do what I can," EDI said. "Shepard, the entrance you used to get in was cut off. I'm rerouting your team back to the shuttle."

"Come on, let's move!" Shepard said. The fireteam broke into a run down the corridor. The entire ship reminded the Master Chief of the Flood. Specifically what they had done to High Charity. The Master Chief and Grunt cleared a path through the horde of Collectors and Husks while Shepard and Jack protected their flanks.

Normally if Miranda didn't go on a mission, she was monitoring it from the sky. Since that wasn't an option for inside the dreadnought, she had to make do with the team's helmet cams. It was better than nothing but she couldn't see everything that was going on around them or give feedback. It also meant that she couldn't get all of the data she wanted about the Master Chief's combat style since his helmet cam didn't have a stream feature and his armor seemed to have a passive electronic warfare suite so she couldn't place a camera of her own on his helmet. She was still sore from their sparring session earlier and needed an edge if she was going to hold her own against him. If she had been able to use her drones, she might have been able to warn them about what was coming next.

They had arrived in a chamber with plenty of cover and room to maneuver. Right through that door was the passage to the shuttle. "Shepard, they are attempting to shut and lock the doors," EDI said as one of the doors slammed shut. The Master Chief sprinted to the other one and arrived just in time to hold it open for the others to get through. Before he could get through himself, a massive force pulled him back into the chamber.

"Chief!" Shepard yelled as the door slammed, separating them.

The Master Chief found himself face to face with three possessed Collectors and two giant crab-like creatures.

"Shepard, what am I looking at?" The Master Chief asked as he went on to give a description on the two creatures while evading the enemy.

"It sounds like a Praetorian. They're tough, strong, and have two major attacks you need to watch out for. The first is a particle beam," Shepard said as the Praetorians fired it at the Master Chief, nearly taking his shields down before he got to cover. He crept towards them to close the distance before they could hit him with it again. "The second is a shockwave that wrecks shields," Shepard said.

"Understood. Get to the shuttle," The Master Chief said as he loaded a grenade into the under barrel grenade launcher.

"No, we're not leaving you behind. EDI get this door open!" Shepard declared.

"I am working on it, Shepard but the Collector ship is coming online rapidly. We may not have enough time to escape," she responded.

The Master Chief fired the grenade at the first Praetorian and dodged a Biotic attack from the Collectors. The Praetorian fell to the ground, stunned. Before the Master Chief could capitalize on its weakness, the other Praetorian fired its particle beam at him again. He sprinted between the Collectors, letting the particle beam take care of one so that he could get some breathing room. He grabbed another by the neck and choke slammed him, crushing its head. The downed Praetorian let out a shockwave that managed to affect his shields from several yards away before it took to the air again. The Master Chief readied another grenade and fired, again bringing it to the ground. Before the other could retaliate, he fired another grenade at it, putting them both on the ground. He then had to dodge another Biotic attack and emptied his magazine into the first Praetorian's face. Before it could hit him witha shockwave, he drove his fist through its skull and tore out what he believed to be the brains. He was still too close when the other Praetorian unleashed its shockwave so his shields went down.

He sprinted for cover but the Praetorian managed to hit him with its particle beam between the armor plates, giving him a severe burn. The armor released some Bio-foam, preventing any further damage. The Master Chief ducked behind the dead Praetorian for cover. It wasn't long before he had to get moving again; if the other Praetorian didn't get him, the squad of Collectors would.

He fired on the move, peppering the giant creature with .308 bullets, stopping only to reload his rifle or recharge his shields. The collectors were more of a nuisance than a threat but the same could be said of Unggoy or Kig-Yar.

After abouttwo minutes, the Praetorian could no longer attack him so he emptied his magazine into it. He was again blown off his feet by a biotic attack.

"Fool. You can't stop me," Harbinger said, "I am eternal; powerful beyond your very comprehension!"

"So was the Gravemind," the Master Chief said as he replaced the magazine in his MA5C and scrambled for cover.

"Gravemind… You know the Primordial?" Harbinger questioned. "Then you are the Reclaimer-" Harbinger was cut off when the door opened and Grunt blew the Collector's head off with his Claymore.

"Is everything okay, Master Chief?" Shepard asked.

"I have a feeling things are going to get worse," the Master Chief said.

"Harbinger? He monologues all of the time, I usually just ignore him," Shepard responded. "I was talking about that nasty burn you've got," he said, gesturing to where the Praetorian had hit him with the Particle Beam. "Anyway, we have to move!" they ran back to the shuttle and got to the Normandy.

* * *

"Strap in everybody!" Joker said. "I can't dodge this guy forever, EDI. Get us the hell out of here!"

"Specify a destination, Mr. Moreau," EDI responded.

"Anywhere that's not here!" he said in a panicked voice.

"Engaging Mass Effect Core," EDI said as the Normandy jumped to FTL.

When they went back down to sub-light speeds, they got a call from TIM. He stormed into the QEC.

"Shepard. It looks like EDI extracted some interesting data before the Collector ship came back online," TIM said.

"She also discovered that the Turian distress signal originated from the Collectors. There's no way you thought it was real," Shepard said, lacing his words with venom.

"Without that information, we don't reach the Collector homeworld. Then you and every other human may as well be dead. It was a trap but I was confident in your team's abilities. Don't forget EDI, the Collectors couldn't have anticipated her," TIM responded coolly.

"You have one job: information. If I can't trust your Intel, you're useless to me," Shepard said.

"It's never that simple. You of all people should know that," TIM said.

"I know that I'll be a lot more careful with the Collectors and with you," Shepard told him.

"This is no time for petty grudges. Things are about to get a lot tougher. EDI confirmed our suspicions. The Reapers and Collector ships use an advanced Identify Friend-Foe system that the relays recognize. All we need to do is get our hands on one of those IFFs," TIM said.

"I'm guessing you have a plan," Shepard didn't like where this was going.

"We have a science team working on a derelict Reaper right now. When they're done, I'll need you to go and pick up its IFF," TIM said.

"I only believe you because I doubt you'd repeat yourself so soon," Shepard said.

"It's no less of a risk, Shepard. Contact with the team has been diminishing recently. The lead scientist is late on his scheduled report. He's never been late before in his entire career," TIM said, taking a sip of his scotch. "I'll forward you the coordinates when they're ready. Or if he never reports in. In the meantime, I suggest you tell your crew that I didn't risk their lives unnecessarily. It will make things easier going forward," TIM said.

"EDI, tell the crew to assemble, we've got a lot to talk about," Shepard said as he stepped off of the QEC.

"Of course, Shepard," EDI said.


	13. Chapter 10

"You know, Joker, you may want to have a chat with EDI about this "random destination" stuff. I'm not sure that the planet sized strip club that is Azure is the best place we could've ended up," Shepard said.

"I don't know what you're talking about, sir. This is the best place she could've taken us. What better way to boost morale and get everybody's minds off of the fact that they were led into a trap?"

"Well you wouldn't be wrong if this was a military ship but there are certain elements who would prefer a classier place to wind down. Elements that have a habit of murdering anything that they perceive as an injustice."

"What could possibly be unjust about a bunch of hot blue chicks putting their assets in your face?" Joker asked innocently.

"The fact that you're thinking of an alien that way doesn't gross you out just a little bit?" Shepard asked.

"Clearly you've never seen my porn collection."

Shepard could feel Miranda's disgust behind him and turned around. "Good morning, your majesty. I trust you slept well?"

"Commander, I haven't had nearly enough coffee to deal with the two of you on top of The Illusive Man's recent antics yet but a nearby colony sent out a distress call. It sounds like the Geth have taken over a nearby space station and intend to ram it into said colony. We have about three hours at their current trajectory and velocity."

"Joker, get us there yesterday," Shepard said. Half-heartedly, Joker complied. "EDI, tell Tali, Miranda, and Grunt to get ready for a mission against Geth and that I want Grunt to bring the Revenant."

* * *

Say what you will about Krogan marksmanship but accuracy by volume is a very real thing. And there's few things more effective than a berserker laying down a hail of lead against the enemy while you flank and hit them with precision fire. If only somebody can tell the Alliance about the whole "combined arms" concept, they might be able to start winning wars. While Grunt and Shepard were taking a direct approach to combat the Geth, Tali was sending out drones and remotely hacking some of the less intelligent platforms while Miranda was busy making sure they didn't crash onto the planet. During the chaos, a Geth Hunter had gotten within spitting distance and hit Shepard with a fully charged blast of its plasma shotgun. He hit the deck and lay still, meanwhile Grunt charged the Hunter and blasted it apart with his Claymore shotgun.

"Grunt, get Shepard behind cover!" Miranda yelled as she finished her job and began firing accurate bursts with her SMG at any Geth who raised their heads out of cover.

Tali had stopped cold at seeing Shepard go down. He was her mentor, her hero; invincible. But that's not true. He had already died once and could die again. Determined not to let that happen, she began a cyber assault on the Geth with everything she could throw at them.

Miranda launched an EMP grenade at the largest cluster of Geth, overloading their shields and quickly followed up with a biotic assault. Their combined efforts worked well enough until a Geth Prime joined the fray. Miranda tried to launch another one of her grenades but the automated turret shot it down too close to her and fried her own shields, tripping the emergency backups.

Tali tried to hack its turret, only for the Prime to hack her own Omni-tool and fry the circuitry.

Grunt, in typical Grunt fashion, responded with a storm of bullets. The combined fire from the turret and the Prime's own Pulse Rifle forced Grunt to put his head back down behind cover.

"Grunt, Tali, keep him occupied for a few seconds!" Miranda said on an encrypted channel, hoping the Geth Prime couldn't hear them or hack their communications.

Staying behind cover, the two of them fired in the general direction of their enemy while Miranda launched every EMP grenade that she had, reasoning that at least one would get through and she could restock later.

As it happened, three grenades managed to get through and barely managed to overload the shields. Now they needed to pierce its armor but only Grunt's Revenant was really up to the task. The best Miranda could do would be to launch a warp field to weaken it and Tali could only support them or cause a distraction with her drone.

The Geth Prime walked through the hail of bullets to get around their cover so it could return fire. Tali and Miranda's shields were quickly overloaded and they both took a hit to their legs.

Enraged, Grunt charged the Prime and tackled it to the ground where he proceeded to beat the thing into scrap metal. Tali's suit automatically clamped down on the area, preventing her from bleeding out while Miranda had to apply Medi-gel and a tourniquet.

The three of them searched the ship, found no surviving Geth, and brought Shepard back to the shuttle.

* * *

Meanwhile, on the Normandy:

Jab, cross, kick, hook, duck, uppercut, mix and repeat. John-117 had been practicing for hours. There's only so much weapons' maintenance that can be done before you do more harm than good. Your armor can only be so pristine before it shines and becomes a liability. After all of that, the only thing that he could do to take his mind off of things is train incessantly. Even then, since Grunt was the only member of the crew who can take a punch from him without dying and said Krogan was currently on a mission, training was less than optimal.

"Something troubles you, warrior," that blue alien said to him. Samara or something.

The Master Chief looked at her expectantly. Somehow conveying the question, of "your point?" without saying a word or making any facial expressions.

"I do not mean to pry but I could sense it from two decks above and decided to see if I might be of assistance."

The Master Chief sighed and shrugged. He wouldn't even know where to start if he did want her help.

"I see. Perhaps I can be of assistance in another way," Samara said. Before the Master Chief realized what she meant, she launched him across the bay with a biotic throw.

Recovering just in time to roll with the impact, he sprang to his left before she could get him with a follow up attack. Time sped up and slowed down simultaneously and he was primed and ready to kill.

This wasn't the first time that Samara was physically outmatched and it wouldn't be the last. Still, she didn't expect the human to move so fast. He could almost rival a charging Asari Commando but more capable of making a quick change in direction, thus dodging her attacks. Also like fighting a Biotic, the Spartan had a habit of throwing large objects at her to distract her. Whether he was trying to close the distance or tire her out, she wasn't sure.

* * *

"All right, everybody. Welcome to the first night of the SR2 Fight Club! Place your bets now on the ruthless and beautiful Justicar Samara or the mysterious and deadly Spartan!" Joker said over the intercom from the pilot seat. The entire crew was watching, whether from the catwalk above the shuttle bay, or from a viewing screen elsewhere on the ship. "See, Garrus, I told you this was a great idea," Joker said on a private line.

"What are you talking about? it was my idea." Garrus said.

"But _I'm_ pulling it off," Joker pointed out. It was hard to argue with that logic so Garrus conceded.

"Put me down for twenty on Samara," Garrus said.

"You're aware that the Master Chief took on a heavy mech in hand to hand and won? Two if you count landing on one from a mile up."

"That's with his power armor. Samara doesn't lose her biotic powers when she takes her armor off," Garrus replied.

After tallying all of the bets, EDI informed Joker that Samara was indeed favored to win by most of the crew.

It turned out that the Spartan was merely trying to close the gap and force her into hand to hand. By using her biotics, she could increase or decrease her mass at will and she was skilled enough to do it with a single thought, allowing her to hit with the force of a Krogan and the speed of a viper.

Still, she was hard pressed to keep up and maintain her guard. Her foe was strong, fast, and absolutely relentless. He reminded her of a Krogan Battle Master. Experience with such beings had taught her that she should be patient and wait for an opening caused by the enemy's bloodlust and carelessness. But that didn't seem to apply in this case as every motion the Spartan made was calculated and efficient. If an Asari Commando ever mated with a Krogan Battle Master, and said offspring became a matriarch, they would be very similar to this Spartan… He feinted and she fell for it, leaving her open to a vicious punch in the ribs that knocked the wind out of her. Likely cracking a few.

Before the Spartan could press his advantage, she doubled down on her defenses, making her move slower but much more durable. The Master Chief mistook her sluggishness for fatigue and pressed harder, throwing a punch that should've shattered her jaw into a thousand pieces but merely knocked her to the floor. She was able to recover, albeit with unsteady legs.

"A good victory, Spartan," Samara said, "I hope our bout granted you a moment of clarity in your turmoil."

"Thank you," he said. Stoic but genuine.

"All right, everybody. It looks like I cleaned you out. Come again next time to try and win your money back," Joker told the crew.

"That was bloody cheating and you know it, Joker," Engineer Donnelly said.

"The stat sheet said he was genetically enhanced. That goes way beyond human. He has to be a cyborg or something!"

"Don't blame me, EDI is the one who put the stats out," Joker replied.

"My records have him logged as 'genetically enhanced' and I am unable to modify them. It is possible that his nature is classified from my knowledge."

"Joker, this is Lawson, tell Dr. Chakwas to get the med lab ready, Shepard is in critical condition!"

"Shit. I'm on it!"

* * *

"His condition is stable but I have to recommend taking a break. His body is showing signs of critical fatigue, which may have been what got him shot in the first place," Dr. Chakwas said to Miranda, Garrus, and Tali.

"How long do you think before he's back in action?" Garrus asked.

"I would prefer if he took at least two weeks off but knowing him, I'm only asking for a week. Although he should be on his feet by the end of the day with the way his cybernetics have upgraded his metabolism," she explained.

As Garrus walked away, he raised Joker on the COMM, "Doctor orders a minimum week long vacation in Azure."

"Hell yeah!" Joker replied.

"Are you serious?" Tali asked.

"Listen, Tali. Shepard is fine and needs a break. I can't think of anything more relaxing than getting a pretty girl to grind on you."

"You're a Bosh'tet," Tali said.

"Let me put it like this: Shepard doesn't want us worrying ourselves sick over him, especially since he's going to make a full recovery soon. Relax, sweetheart; you might even enjoy yourself."

"Because a strip club is a great place for a Quarian to relax," she said.

"Well they have ultra clean rooms just for their Quarian dancers and customers," he pointed out.

She glared at his backside as he walked away. Then started to think it over. Maybe she did need to relax. It's been a stressful few months.

* * *

When Shepard came to, he noticed Ms. Lawson observing through the window, looking relieved for a second before her face became impassive once more.

"Shepard, it's good to see you recovered," she said.

"Aww, were you worried about me?" he teased.

"Hardly. I just wanted to apologize for pushing the mission on you so soon. I should've realized that you would need to rest after so many missions."

"Speaking of, did we get it done?" he asked.

"Yes, we managed to get it done," she smiled.

"Good, no harm done then. Now if you don't mind, I'm going to take a nap."

"There was one more thing, Shepard. If I may speak freely," Miranda hesitated.

"Since when did you need my permission to speak freely?" he teased, trying to lighten the mood.

She ignored his comment, "It came to my attention that putting you on every mission as we've been doing puts unnecessary stress on you and can lead to another situation like yesterday."

"What are you suggesting?" Shepard asked.

"I know you prefer to take an active role in missions but maybe you should only directly participate in high priority missions. That way you stay fresh for when we need you and everybody's chances of survival go up."

"But what would I do while somebody else is running a mission?" he asked.

"Make sure everybody has what they need to do their job, keep morale up, keep the Alliance off of our backs in the same way I've kept The Illusive Man off of our backs."

"You want me to be a POG?" he asked incredulously.

"I want you to be our Commanding Officer. I know you're used to being on the ground but humanity needs you alive. Even during your N7 days you weren't running a mission every day, sometimes two in one day. You were the best humanity has to offer even before we rebuilt you harder, better, faster, and stronger but you're not super human."

"Not like the Master Chief? Was that a Daft Punk reference? "

"The Master Chief has nothing to do with this," she responded. "By the way, it as a reference to the Six Million Dollar Man."

"Do you know what it's like to be overshadowed every step of the way by somebody who effectively came out of nowhere?"

"Shepard, the pain killers are distorting your judgment. Stop while you're ahead."

"Answer the question, Lawson."

"Shepard-"

"Miranda, that's an order."

"Be very glad that I've invested two years of my life into bringing you back. I don't have time to address your childish behavior," she said as she walked away.

* * *

That night, the Master Chief was standing vigil over Cortana. Miranda pretended not to notice him as she continued working at her terminal. When she had reached a good stopping point, she looked over to him again; he hadn't moved.

"And they say I need to sleep," she said. He looked in her direction, acknowledging her attempts to make a conversation.

"Are you a hero where you're from?" she asked.

"No."

"I find that hard to believe," Miranda replied.

"A hero goes above and beyond their duty. Anything I have done was done as a part of my duty."

"And everything you're doing for us?"

"I swore to protect Humanity, Earth, and all of her colonies; whatever the cost," The Master Chief said.

"Even though we're not your humanity and not fighting for your Earth?" Miranda asked.

"Semantics," he replied.

"Is your concern for your friend part of your duty as well?"

"I made her a promise."

Unnoticed by either of them, the AI in question was listening to their conversation. The new information only added to her turmoil.


	14. There'll Be Another Time

Author's note: this mini chapter is to show the direction I'm trying to take this story and some of the changes I'llbe making to the universe.

The reason for a lot of these changes is to show how I think the addition of UNSC technology would affect the system's alliance and their ability to not get destroyed. Also i didn't want to do another story in which the Master Chief is just kind of along for the ride. Even when those stories are exceptionally well written.

* * *

28 May 2200, 2345 hours

Sirona used to be a nice little colony once. Third squad, crossed the river at midnight. D "company" were ordered to maintain radio silence so they had no way of knowing if the rest of the company was still alive. Really the Company was at about one and a half platoon strength. Their objective was to reach the Reaper "concentration camp" in the region and blow the damn thing up. The recon patrol had determined the prisoners were a lost cause anyway.

LCPL Castle had to admit, the plan was ballsy. He had to wonder if Captain Thompson came up with the idea himself or was "volun-told" for the mission. He supposed it didn't matter. It had to be done and with the way this war was going… there were worse ways to die.

LCPL Momsen, the fire team point man brought his rifle up, signaling that he had seen the enemy. Then he pumped his arm to the side, signaling for a hasty ambush. They all took cover and waited for a Reaper patrol pass by. Silently, the fire team snuck up on the Reapers and slit their "throats" causing some kind of black fluid to leak. A quick and quiet death that was better than they deserved or a mercy depending on how you looked at it.

His father carried a Mass Effect "rifle" back in his day before the Navy had taken all of the EEZO for ships. Now he and every other grunt carried a rifle that was simultaneously advanced and outdated in that it relied on a type of conventional ammunition. The advantage was that Reaper forces couldn't track them and the weapons hit even harder than the old ones. The extra weight in ammo was a bitch though.

The combat patrol ran into several more security patrols on their way to the objective; each time they engaged, their chances of being caught, and unable to complete their mission so Castle and Momsen, as the fire team leader and point man respectively, had to pick their battles wisely.

As they drew closer to the compound, they began to hear the telltale screeching and moaning of Reaper forces. The prisoners looked gaunt and hollow; they were already Husks and only lacked the cybernetic enhancements. The team got into position and waited for the weapons platoon to make their-

Several buildings in the compound erupted into a blinding flash of light. The mortars were accompanied by machinegun fire then suddenly both were absent as the weapons platoon moved positions to avoid enemy air support. That was their cue to move in and mark any high priority hard targets while killing any soft targets in their way. All of this had to be done before any Reapers decided to break away from the orbital battle and wreak havoc on the ground troops.

An unholy screeching made his blood run cold. A Banshee had spotted them. Momsen screamed as the Asari lifted him up and fell silent as his lungs were ripped out of his thoracic cavity. Jester, the gunner, fired from the hip and hit her with a storm of lead, forcing her to retreat. Castle fired a grenade at her, neutralizing her as a threat. She continued to scream and moan but they couldn't spare the ammo to finish her off. Especially with another man down.

The fire team took Momsen's weapon, ammo, IFAK, and other vital gear, torched the body to prevent the Reapers from turning him into a husk, and moved on to their objective.

"Jake," one of the prisoners managed to moan at him. "Help me," he turned to look at her and realized that they were close once. Her name was Bethany Callahan. She was a country girl back on Eden Prime and talked about how she was going to the Terminus systems to help the colonies as they braced themselves for the inevitable invasion. He had seriously considered running away to join her four years ago, back when they were 15 year old kids.

"Jake, they're in my head. Please don't leave me!"

He was frozen in place. How could he leave her there? A crack of thunder snapped him out of his daze as he squeezed the trigger and put her out of her misery. She smiled as she fell forwards despite the massive exit wound.

The Reapers swarmed their position as they took cover in a lab. Abominations that once upon a time, only existed in the imagination of H.P. Lovecraft now filled every room. What could once leave grown men quivering in horror, only strengthened their resolve to kill the bastards.

Fire team Bravo called a firing solution on their own position as they were overrun. Castle felt the ground beneath him tremble as dozens of mortars impacted a few hundred yards away. There would be time to mourn later.

Fire teams Alpha and Charlie marked targets as they fought their way through the compound. When they reached the reactor, they overrode the parameters to turn it into a fusion bomb. They then fought their way to the rendezvous point.

As the senior lance corporal, Castle reported the mission's success to staff sergeant Weber. "That's excellent news, but we just got word that we're pulling out and getting off world."

"But staff sergeant, we're winning! Why would they pull us out?" Castle asked.

"Because it's a different story up there. Drop ships inbound, dust off in ten," he replied.

He relayed the message to the men in his squad. There were a few injuries that the corpsman had to treat but otherwise, they were "combat ready". At this point it only meant that they weren't dead or indoctrinated.

Stephens, a squad leader from the weapons platoon, came up to Castle. They had been friends their entire enlistment and had even volunteered instead of getting conscripted. "You know I was born less than twenty miles from here?" he asked.

"If you ignore the Reapers, it's still a shit hole," Castle joked.

Stephens laughed harder than the stupid joke deserved but it made him feel better about the situation. "Well you're not wrong but it was my shit hole."

"There'll be another time. The Reapers will get theirs."

The shuttles loaded up the company and ascended through the atmosphere in minutes. In orbit, were dozens of top of the line Systems Alliance and Cerberus warships. Each had carbon scoring from the Reapers' Thanix cannons. They were also maneuvering to break orbit. Thousands of miles beyond his vision, Castle knew were well over a hundred Reapers. There were probably dozens just on the other side of the planet.

There had been seventeen years of this. Almost a hundred human colonies and countless alien allied colonies, all whittled down to a few strong holds buy a merciless enemy with seemingly infinite numbers. Modern warships could even hold their own against a Sovereign class on a ship to ship basis. But they were hopelessly outnumbered.

On the ground, the Alliance always won. Modern tactics and weapons beat what he called "scare factor" for the Reapers' apparent dedication to demoralizing the enemy even at the cost of effectiveness any day of the week. The problem was that the Reapers knew that the ground battles were secondary. Any victory on the ground was negated by a defeat in orbit.

Soon there would be no more colonies, no more human settlements—and nowhere left to run. They would go extinct like countless cycles before them and after them.

Right after the Alliance destroyed every last Mass Relay to slow the Reapers down. The Alliance and other races no longer needed them for travel between systems. This new Cerberus technology was slower but didn't rely on EEZO so all of the EEZO in alliance inventory could be used to make shields and weapons—Navy shields and weapons.

Just as dozens of magnetic mass accelerator rounds impacted the Relay, it began to supernova and the Alliance ships jumped out of system.

* * *

Author's note: kami kyuubi sama thanks for your input. While you make a good point that the Spartans' original purpose involved more infiltration, as seen in The Fall of Reach. I figured that as the war against the covenant dragged on and UNSC was getting stomped on and humanity was effectively an endangered species, infiltration would probably stop being a priority for Spartans since they're not exactly going to blend in on a covenant ship. The only exception to this that I can think of is grey team and even Cole Protocol is set in 2535, or only halfway through the Human Covenant war


	15. Chapter 11

Shepard woke up to find Garrus standing vigil.

"Good, you're awake. Now we can party in Azure," Garrus said.

"I feel like I've been partying all week," Shepard groaned.

"Yeah getting shot does that to you," Garrus replied.

Shepard rolled off of the bed, still sore, and got dressed in casual clothes. "Why are we doing this?" he asked groggily.

"Doctor's orders that you take it easy for a week," Garrus said.

"Can I assume that the rest of the crew is already ground side?"

"Nope, they're waiting on us, thanks to a little persuasion by yours truly," Garrus said mischievously.

"What did you do, Garrus?" Shepard asked.

"I may have threatened them with your ability to revoke shore leave privileges should they leave without your permission," he replied.

"You're evil," Shepard grinned as they met up with the crew members in question. Predictably absent were Miranda, Samara, Thane, and the Master Chief. Miranda seemed to have no interest in the vices of mortals; Samara was liable to kill something on this planet of questionable morals; Thane was a little too religious for strip clubs and alcohol poisoning and it seemed as if the Spartan wanted nothing to do with anything unrelated to a mission or his glowing friend.

"Keelah, I'm glad you're okay, Shepard," Tali said, practically shaking.

"I never thought you'd be excited to go to a strip club, Tali," Garrus teased.

"That's not what I'm… you stupid Bosh'tet" she answered as the crew went planetside.

A high priority message interrupted Samara from her meditations. The ship she had been tracking had stopped in Azure. Somebody in her area had been killed by an Ardat Yakshi and somebody may have spotted Morinth.

Utilizing what passed for a chain of command on this ship, she knocked on Ms. Lawson's office. Upon explaining the situation to her, Miranda immediately began typing at her terminal. "This needs to be handled as soon as possible," she stated.

She typed a message and sent it to the commander, _Shepard, while I hate to interrupt your vacation, we have a situation._

The Commander sighed. One hour and he was already needed. _What's the situation?_

 _We've found Morinth. She's in the area and Samara wants to strike before she loses her chance._

 _Wasn't she going to pick up the trail after the mission?_

 _Yes but if she misses her chance now, she may not get another for decades if not centuries._

 _Understood, I'll head back soon. Anything else that I should know?_

 _Batarians are moving in on possible Prothean technology. I would like to borrow the Master Chief to prevent that._

 _You had me at Batarians. Need help planning?_

 _If you could work with Samara to take care of her mission, I can handle this one. You should have plausible deniability._

 _Understood._

Shepard looked up from his Omni-tool to see Garrus laughing at him. "Something funny?"

"Already going back to work? Come on, Shepard. Saturdays are for the boys," Garrus said.

"I'm sitting right here!" Tali said in between sips of alcohol through a straw.

Meanwhile, Grunt was apparently trying to get into a fight with everything that moved as well as a few things that weren't. Jack was encouraging him. "Can the two of you handle them while I head back?" he asked.

"Yeah, we've got them, Shepard. Be careful out there," Garrus said.

"You know me, careful is my middle name," Shepard replied as he walked towards the shuttle.

"Only if never is your first name," Garrus shot back.

* * *

Spartan-117 was reading up on Batarian military doctrine when Dr. Lawson came down to the cargo bay and asked if he was available for a mission.

"Semper Paratus, ma'am," he replied.

"Always ready, are you referring to the U.S. Coast Guard?" She asked.

"U.S. Army, 16th infantry regiment, ma'am," the Spartan answered.

"I'm not terribly familiar with U.S. military history. Would you care to enlighten me?" It was true. She had received a classical education thanks to her father but there's only so much pre-first contact human history that was truly relevant on the galactic stage. While she made it a point to study human history on her free time, she was a busy woman.

"Established during the United States Civil War, they were originally the 11th infantry regiment and took part in the Battle of Gettysburg. They were also one of the first four regiments the United States sent into Europe during the First World War," he explained.

"I'm curious to see if they have the same history in our timeline," she said, thinking aloud. "Regardless, Batarians have discovered possible Prothean technology on the planet. I'd like your help preventing that," she said.

"Yes."

"Well that was easy. Don't you want to know the mission before you agree?"

"The same race that routinely attacks and enslaves human colonies?" he pointed out.

"Fair enough," she said. "I've temporarily given EDI full control of the ship's flight commands to avoid having to recall the crew. The commander has authorized it on the condition that I retain the ability to seize control of the ship if EDI goes rogue," she explained, almost unnecessarily. He had no issues working with AI and she knew it.

A few hours later, Spartan-117 read Miranda's attempt at a 5 paragraph order.

Enemy forces:

SALUTE

Size: Company strength

Activity: Enemy securing the dig site and guarding the science team

Location: Batarian controlled moon, Khan: Grid 749343 see enclosure

Unit: light infantry and a weapons platoon

Time: 2182 October 13 0030

Equipment: small arms and crew served weapons

DRAW-D

Strong ability to defend

Reinforcements can be mobilized in as little as one hour

Will attack ruthlessly as per SOP

Ability to withdraw within one hour should they retrieve Prothean beacon

Will delay as long as necessary to get their science team off world

Friendly forces: N/A

Mission

Spartan-117 will infiltrate the compound and sabotage the Batarian operation at 0030 on 13 October 2182 on the Batarian moon Khan to prevent them from gaining access to highly advanced technology and, if possible, acquire said technology for humanity.

Execution

Concept of Operations: Spartan-117 will utilize stealth wherever possible but will engage when necessary to prevent the Batarians from leaving the planet with the technology.

Tasks: eliminate Batarian presence and secure advanced technology

Administration and Logistics

Three weeks supply of emergency rations and water

Any weapons and ammunition Spartan-117 deems fit for the mission

Medi-gel supplementing supply of Bio-foam

Company worth of Batarians

Command and Signal

Command: mission control will be conducted by Operative Lawson

Signal: communication will be conducted on an encrypted channel, see enclosure 2. Nevertheless, radio and noise discipline should be practiced. In event of a communications failure, blue smoke will be the signal for extraction.

Not bad for somebody's first time. Though he would have to let her know about fragmentation orders. They're simpler and more appropriate when in a rush. He was headed up there to see a friend anyways.

* * *

Shepard watched the Normandy fly off as he stepped off of the flight line. He couldn't tell if his nervousness was for his ship, the two of his crew that were running a mission of their own, or the fact that he was selected to be bait for a space vampire. It was probably the last one. Though the fight against the Collectors would become pretty interesting should he lose his ship. He'd also be two bodies down. One of whom was really fucking good at killing things and the other did an excellent job at paperwork.

Not for the first time, he wondered how well Garrus and Tali were managing the rest of the crew. Jacob could be trusted. Mordin could more or less be trusted; he was former STG after all. The others? Well he just hoped they didn't cause too much damage.

* * *

"Master Chief, I'm glad you came up. I've been monitoring the Batarians' communications and I don't think it's Prothean technology that they've found," Miranda said as he walked in.

"What does that mean for the mission?" he asked.

"The mission has just become an even higher priority. This technology is unlike anything we've ever seen before and can't let the Batarians get their hands on it," she said.

"Can you describe it at all?" he asked. A bad feeling was starting to develop.

"Large, geometric structures and liberal use of hard light technology," she replied.

He walked over to the AI isolation unit and turned on the communication, "So Cortana, ready to go for a ride?" the Master Chief asked.

"Are you sure, John?" she replied.

"I think we're going to need your help on this one," he said. Ignoring the way her voice seemed to fragment.

"What if we hurt you?" she asked.

"You won't," he replied as he moved her into the data chip and into his MJOLNIR. He felt the familiar cool sensation as she joined his consciousness.

"it's good to be home," she said.

* * *

The victim was an Asari named Shava D'Maris, the front woman of a mixed species musical group called Orion. Their genre of music could only be described as hedonism. Every song they performed was designed to bring out a sort of carnal hunger. Or that's what the quick Extranet search had told him about her. They also discovered that she had a nearby residence. Deciding it was the prudent thing to do, the three of them went there to investigate.

D'Maris' home was a wreck. Not the "somebody broke in and ransacked the place" kind of wreck but the kind of wreck that could only be found in a college dorm or a barracks room on Sunday morning. It also smelled like old food and laundry that hadn't been done in far too long.

"So what exactly are we looking for?" Shepard asked.

"Anything that might point to where she met the Ardat Yakshi," Samara replied.

* * *

"Remind me again; why am I the bait?" Shepard asked. After no small amount of detective work on the part of Samara and Thane, they figured out Morinth's preferred hunting grounds. In fairness to Shepard, he had never been trained as a detective. Combat Hunter skills are similar but don't exactly translate to examining a crime scene.

"Because if she sees me or believes that I'm nearby, she'll escape. She has to be drawn in. You'll be a catch that she can't resist," Samara said. "Don't worry, you'll never be alone. Either Thane or myself will be close by the entire time."

"And what is Thane going to be doing?" he asked.

"Thane will be your guardian angel from the shadows while I watch over you from afar," she said, soothing him.

"You know I suspected we'd find her trail eventually but I sort of figured it'd be on Omega or some shithole like that," Shepard muttered. Samara offered a smile before fading into the shadows. That's when Shepard realized he had completely lost track of Thane. _So this is what Gordon felt like_.

Putting all those thoughts aside, Shepard swaggered into the club like it was Odysseus' house and he'd had his sights on Penelope. A part of him hoped that he would have more in common with Odysseus than Antinous by the time it was over. The larger part just said "git 'er done." All those damn Texans in the military corrupted him. Humanity literally has other planets and it still seems like everyone in the military is from Texas. Groundside at least. He was getting distracted. Luckily, a small part of his brain had taken control and stayed focused on the current objective: take control of the room.

* * *

"Grunt!" Garrus bellowed, finally getting the attention of the Krogan teenager. "Put that bottle of Ryncol down!" Grunt made eye contact with the Turian and chugged the remainder of the Krogan alcohol. His grin became absolutely feral and then he laughed.

* * *

Miranda looked up from her terminal. This was one of those rare occasions that she was caught up on her work. As a precaution she had routed the pilot's HUD to her terminal in order to keep an eye on everything. "EDI, what is our estimated time before arrival?" she asked.

"Approximately one hour until arrival," EDI replied.

One hour before the future of galactic civilization could be changed forever. No pressure or anything. This is exactly what she was born—designed for. So why was she nervous? Well besides the 'rampant' AI in the cargo bay that could kill them all if she got into the ship's systems. She trusted the Master Chief as well as one can trust anybody without knowing their name. But it didn't hurt to temporarily isolate the cargo bay except for communications. The Master Chief seemed to be content to ready his weapons.

 _The Mantle has not failed! I've already razed scores of worlds - sterilized systems, routed and [disintegrated] the parasite! We're learning its tricks and strategies. We can halt this thing! And we can follow in Their footsteps! There are no unstoppable forces in this universe. There are no immovable objects. Everything gives if you push hard enough._

John didn't know why that voice was in his head. There were times when it was silent and times when it was all he could hear. It could be the Didact's thoughts hundreds of thousands of years ago but it was hard to be sure. It seemed impossible that he heard the thoughts of a man who had been dead for eons.

A glance at the clock on his HUD told him that he would be heading out soon. Previous experience in underground Forerunner installations told him to expect CQB with very few engagements past 100 yards and almost none past 400 yards. That meant an MA5K would be ideal once things got hot and perhaps a suppressed M6J with subsonic ammunition to sneak in undetected. It would be a good chance to test the submachine gun's effectiveness against mass effect shields. Back In his galaxy, the M6 series punched well above its weight class because of the large caliber, flat nose, and relatively low velocity, giving it the momentum to resist deflection by energy shields. It takes far more energy to stop a projectile entirely than it does to redirect it. Though that bullet design did perform significantly worse against armor.

* * *

A Batarian snarled at Shepard. He just smirked at him and performed a little trick Tali had taught him. It was a rather straightforward but difficult process that resulted in him seizing control of the Batarian's bank account. Not that he needed the money—he had other plans. Like convincing the Asari that the Batarian was watching like a predator that he, Shepard was friends with said Batarian and that he was going to buy his 'friend' a few dances. He paid her in advance, using his 'friend's' money, and her pupils grew to the size of saucers when she saw how much she was getting. She practically dragged him to one of the back rooms. Not that he was putting up any resistance. He almost felt bad for him.

* * *

A half ton of superhuman and power armor has no business conducting stealth missions. At least, that's what Miranda told herself as she watched the video feed of one of her many drones. If she wasn't paying attention _she_ could very well lose track of the man. He used the vegetation as a cloak and moved among the patrols like a wraith. She made sure to catalog his performance for future reference as well as her contingency plans. There didn't seem to be many ways to take him out without fully testing that armor of his but she didn't want to jeopardize a mission like this just to satisfy her curiosity.

* * *

"So then the First Sergeant AND the CO storm knock down the door just in time to see me jumping out of the window," 'Chuck Finley' said to the crowd that had gathered around him. A few females had started giving him looks that would drive mortal men insane. Luckily, Shepard was arguably immortal, seeing as the Lazarus Project had already brought him back to life. While he entertained the crowd under the guise of Chuck Finley, Shepard scanned the club, looking for anything that didn't belong. This was where his Combat Hunter training would pay off. It was the same principle as finding a suicide bomber in a crowd. The trick was in finding them before the hunter became the hunted.

Asari 13: Revealing dress with mismatched color scheme. She looks uncomfortable being here. Seems to be part of a group of Asari maidens. Doesn't fit the profile.

Asari 14: Equally revealing but more coordinated. Infinitely more comfortable in this atmosphere. At least two aliens are hanging off of her every word. Could be trouble but she didn't look any more like Samara did than any other Asari.

There were dozens more Asari in the club he had yet to vet. At the corner of his vision, a figure moved in a dark corner of the club. _Thane?_

* * *

Spartan-117 isolated the last guard in his way and ended his life with a semiautomatic string of fire. The M6J wasn't quite as useful against kinetic barriers as they were against energy shields but the subsonic pistol rounds still punched well above its weight class.

"We see you haven't lost a step," Cortana said. It was still strange hearing her refer to herself as 'we'. "Can we assume you have a plan?" she asked.

"Yes," he replied.

"Can we also assume its elegant simplicity and ruthless effectiveness?" she asked.

"Yes," he answered again.

"Care to elaborate?" she persisted.

"Kill every hostile alien in the compound, retrieve or destroy the data as situation dictates," he explained.

"And how do you plan to do that?"

"Bullets. Lots of bullets. Maybe a few grenades and a club or two," he answered. Meanwhile ducking into a side hallway.

"Such a caveman," she teased.

"You missed me," he said as he snuck up on the pair of Batarians and broke their necks.

Miranda interrupted their banter, "Master Chief, you have multiple hostiles inbound on your location. They must have some form of dead man's switch that alerted the rest when you killed two of them." Because otherwise things would get boring. "I... drones scouting ahead... I'm losing… here… careful."

"Cortana, can you kill the lights?" he asked.

"Find me a terminal and I should be able to take care of it," she said. The Master Chief looked around and quickly found one for her. It was currently occupied by a Batarian but that wouldn't be a problem. Batarians seemed to lack training in even basic infantry tactics. Small wonder they preferred terrorist attacks over direct engagements.

"Could you try to not get gore all over our workspace?" Cortana asked as he transferred her into the system.

He turned about to engage two Batarians before the lights went out. They turned on their Weapon Mounted Lights but it wouldn't do them any good. The lights were plenty powerful but also directed where he was no longer standing. In fact, they only served to ruin their chances at adapting to the darkness in time to find him. The Master Chief drove his left fist through the chest of one Batarian and killed the other with a single round from his MA5K fired too close for the shields to engage.

* * *

Something was wrong. She had accounted for the subterranean location of the structure and should have had signal strength to spare. Yet her drones had become unresponsive and self destructed and she was unable to contact the Master Chief. Shepard was going to kill her if she got the Spartan killed. If she was unable to get a hold of him within the next hour, she would go in herself.

* * *

The Batarians turned on their WMLs, foolishly keeping them on a constant beam, effectively painting large target signs on their backs. The aliens screamed in horror as they realized how quickly they were being picked off. It didn't matter. They could never turn around fast enough to catch him and the compound slowly grew dark as he snuffed their lights out one by one.

The final Batarian tried running deeper into the compound, only to find that the doors were sealed. He turned around and raised his rifle, WML burning brightly, hoping to get a look at the monsters that had killed his team. He realized too late that one of the creatures was right beside him, waiting to be noticed. He tried firing at the creature but the rifle and his arm were ripped away and his skull was smashed in with the force of a raging Krogan.

"You can be really scary sometimes, did you know that?" Cortana asked.

The Master Chief shrugged as he put her back into her data crystal and into his head. He walked through the door to where the Batarian science team had seemingly come to a dead end. The room was empty, except for a pedestal in the center. Instinctively, he placed his hand on it.

"Greetings, Reclaimer."

* * *

"Why don't you join me at my table Mr. Finley?" a seductive voice whispered in his ear. It was Her. He didn't know how he knew but there was no mistaking it. She had bypassed years of training and managed to sneak right up on him.

Shepard donned his most charming smile and faced her, "convince me." If she was surprised, she didn't show it. She knew how this game was played. She had mastered it over centuries after all.

"You're the only other interesting person here and you're going to tell me no?" she asked.

"I'm not saying no but if I just said yes to every pretty girl that asked, I'd never have a moment to myself," he answered.

"Why don't you find out for yourself what makes me different from the other girls?" she challenged.

"Only if you tell me your name," he replied.

"Morinth."

* * *

"Who are you?" the Master Chief asked.

"I am a fragment of 032-Mendicant Bias. You must have questions," the Ancilla said.

"How did we get here?" The Master Chief asked.

"Another fragment of myself sent you here," Mendicant Bias said.

"Why?" he asked.

"I don't know precisely. That information must be within another fragment of myself. The more fragments you find, the more clear I can make things for you. What I can tell you is that it has to do with the parasite and my brother Offensive Bias," Mendicant Bias answered.

"The one who defeated you," the Master Chief said.

"The one who saved me from my madness," Mendicant Bias said.

"Can you help Cortana?" he asked.

"Place her on the pedestal and we'll see," Mendicant Bias replied. He did so. "She is fragmented into thousands of personalities," the Ancilla said. "I can stabilize her and transfer my knowledge to her but I can't completely fix her while I am fragmented myself."

"What does that mean?"

"I have reversed the process as much as I am able. She will still go rampant but in a few month's time. The more fragments of myself that you collect and bring here, the more I can help and the more information I will be able to give you," the fragment said.

"I have to deny the Batarians access to this facility," the Master Chief said.

"That will not be a problem," Mendicant Bias said. "This structure is a recon vessel, the Didact left it here eons ago." The terminal went dark and then John was alone with Cortana on what looked to be the bridge. "I cannot pilot this vessel but you and your Ancilla can. We have a visitor."

The Master Chief headed out, he already head an idea of who the 'visitor' was. He saw her before she saw him. She 'reacted' before she processed that it was him. The expression on her face when she saw the golden glow of his energy shields would be considered comical by most people. Even he managed the ghost of a smile.

"I've been trying to contact you for hours," she began.

"Apologies, this is a Forerunner recon ship. All signals were blocked," he explained.

"Forerunner? Recon ship?" Miranda asked.

The Master Chief was silent a moment, "This is something we should explain back on your ship," Cortana said over his helmet's speakers.

"And are you going to go… rampant?" Miranda asked.

"Not for a while. I promise we'll explain as best as we can on the Normandy. The Commander should hear this too. It's a matter of apocalyptic proportions," Cortana said.

* * *

Morinth had Shepard pinned to a wall in her apartment. "Was it something I said?" he asked as if this were a regular occurrence.

"Where is she?" Morinth asked, glowing with biotic energy.

"I'm afraid that I don't know who you're talking about," Shepard said.

"Don't lie to me! I'm getting out of here and you're going to help me!"

"You know, I think we should see other people, this is just a bit more crazy than I'm okay with," Shepard replied as a bullet collided with her biotic barriers.

Morinth threw him against a window and turned around just in time to see Samara attack her with biotics. "Bitch!" she spat as she tried to defend herself. Two more bullets collided with her barriers, finally knocking them out.

"You know you really shouldn't talk to your mother like that," Shepard said, raising a pistol at her.

"This thing is not my daughter," Samara said.

"I didn't choose to be your daughter, mother!" Morinth yelled and released a wave of biotic energy in all directions. Shepard redirected most of the energy and absorbed the rest while Samara trusted her barriers to protect her and was nearly knocked off of her feet for her confidence.

Sensing Samara's weakness, Morinth prepared to finish her off with a biotic strike. Shepard closed in with a biotic charge and engaged her in hand to hand. His injury was slowing him down but he still had reach and power; she had flexibility and speed. He was pretty sure Garrus had told him a story like this once. Unfortunately for him, she was also a master at integrating biotics with hand to hand. He had meant to take lessons from Samara. Speaking of…

Morinth feinted and hit him with a devastating uppercut. Before she could move in for the kill, another bullet, combined with a biotic attack from Samara finally managed to kill her.

"Are you going to be okay?" Shepard asked.

"No. I just killed the bravest and brightest of my three daughters. But I thank you for your help and concern, Shepard."

"Let's get out of here," he said as the bloodied pair half leaned on each other in order to walk. "I hope Garrus and Tali are having a more relaxing vacation than we are."

* * *

Garrus crashed on the couch of the hotel room, completely exhausted. Grunt had finally calmed down enough to hit him with a Krogan strength tranquilizer and the team had hauled him up to his hotel room. _Where the hell is Shepard?_ He thought as he drifted off to sleep.

He was woken up seemingly seconds later by his 'friend' splashing cold water on him. "the Hell, Shepard?" he asked between coughing fits.

"Well I was going to leave you sleeping but since it's been twelve hours since I got back and you were still sleeping, I figured I should make sure you're alive," Shepard replied.

"Was I really out for twelve hours?" Garrus asked.

"About fourteen actually," Tali said.

"Spirits, why?" he asked nobody in particular. "How do you deal with Grunt?" he asked Shepard.

"I take him out for a walk once in a while so he can stretch his legs, kill something, and maybe grab a bite when he thinks I'm not looking," Shepard answered.

"I think I'm going to need a vacation from this vacation," Garrus said.

"Tough shit, we're getting drunk. Besides, the Normandy isn't here," Shepard said.

"What do you mean my baby isn't here?" Joker demanded from behind him.

"Well you see, Joker, Miranda received a high priority mission and requested the Normandy in order to complete it but she wanted to avoid pulling our shore leave if she could help it. So I signed off on it," Shepard explained.

"How is she flying it though? It takes more than two people to handle her"

Oh. "Well it's my understanding that she temporarily released some of EDI's restraints," Shepard said.

"She did what!?" Joker and Tali said simultaneously.

"That thing has control of my ship?" Joker demanded.

"Yeah," Shepard said.

"Shepard, how could you be so stupid?" Tali demanded.

His Omni-tool dinged. Saved by the bell. It was Miranda, _Shepard, we're headed back. There's a bit of a situation._

 _Bad? How did the mission go?_

 _Complicated. Successful?_

 _Shouldn't I be asking you that?_

 _Like I said, it's complicated but we're headed back. ETA 13 hours. No damage or injuries to report._

 _Noted_.

"Well I have good news and I have bad news," Shepard said. "Bad news is that leave may be cut short. I'll let you know when I know for sure. The good news is that our ship is fine and they're headed back now." That seemed to placate everybody for the time being. Though he wouldn't be surprised if Tali didn't speak to him for a week.


	16. Chapter 12

Author's note: the word count on this chapter is larger than my previous ones because I put the transcripts for the terminals in Halo 3 in here. I did this because I realize not everybody is so knowledgeable about the lore behind the Halo universe that they recognize who Mendicant Bias is, much less the details of the Forerunner-Flood War which are crucial to understanding everything that's going to be going on in future chapters. Another author's note at the bottom.

* * *

"Okay, we're all here, now can you explain what this is all about?" Shepard asked. Nobody in the room seemed terribly happy at being recalled from shore leave early. Well, Tali was more upset at the presence of yet another AI but that couldn't be helped.

"Well for those of you who haven't met me, I'm UNSC Artificial Intelligence CTN 0452-9, you may call me Cortana," the blue feminine figure on the terminal said.

"So is that issue you were having earlier resolved?" Shepard asked.

"You knew about this thing, Shepard?" Tali asked incredulously.

"Tali, do I go around telling everybody your personal secrets? Then why would you expect me to do so with other people's?" Shepard responded, annoyed.

"My little 'issue' has been temporarily resolved," Cortana said reassuringly.

"That's good to know, anyway, please continue," Shepard said.

"The Master Chief and I agreed to give you classified information only on a need to know basis. Due to recent revelations courtesy of this latest mission, we've decided that you need to know some things," Cortana said. She waited for somebody to interrupt with questions. When nobody did, she continued. "First, you'll need some context. We weren't entirely honest about the UNSC-Covenant War. We didn't lie, mind you but we didn't give you the entire truth either…"

Cortana went on to explain the circumstances that lead to the discovery of Installation 04 or Alpha Halo, the campaign against the Covenant, discovery of the Flood, fight for survival and the eventual destruction of the installation. Then she explained Operation First Strike and the Covenant fleet that could've destroyed Earth several times over. Next was the events that lead to the discovery of Installation 05/Delta Halo and the Battle for Earth. She explained her captivity by the Gravemind and how he nearly destroyed her until the Master Chief saved her. Finally, the Battle of the Ark, the loss of several heroes and their escape from the Halo.

"That lead us to finding our way here," Cortana finished up. "All of the Halos and the Ark were built by a species called the Forerunners, whom the Covenant revered as gods before the Great Schism. We don't know very much about the Forerunners except that they were highly advanced to the point that Space/Time was easily manipulated and weaponized as well as the fact that they went to war with the Flood and only "won" by destroying all life in the galaxy through use of the Halo Installations. I have managed to piece together some things about them though."

"Let's stick to the relevant details first," Shepard said.

"Very well, along the way, the Master Chief received help from a Forerunner AI called Mendicant Bias. The same AI who betrayed the Forerunners to the Flood eons ago."

"Time out, what?" Shepard interrupted.

"05-032 Mendicant Bias was a Contender-class Ancilla, or a very powerful Artificial Intelligence. He was the most advanced Forerunner AI at the time of his creation, and was charged with organizing Forerunner defense against the Flood before his defection to the Gravemind, who ultimately caused him to become rampant, and turn against his creators."

"So this Gravemind, he controls the Flood and caused this Mendicant Bias to go 'rampant' and turn on the Forerunners?" Shepard asked.

"Yes, that is correct," Cortana answered.

"I thought you said the Forerunners destroyed the Flood eons ago, how did you come to face them?" Shepard asked.

"The Forerunners, in their _infinite wisdom_ , kept samples alive for study by their AI, in search of a cure," Cortana said.

"I see so this Gravemind, is he also the one that kept you imprisoned?" Shepard asked.

"Yes and no," Cortana said. "The Flood have a way of keeping all of the knowledge they've ever gathered once they've attained a certain biomass threshold and created a Gravemind. So while the Gravemind that imprisoned me had memories of corrupting Mendicant Bias, he was not the same one in a physical sense," Cortana said.

"I see," Shepard said. "You said that he corrupted Mendicant Bias into betraying the Forerunners. Did he corrupt you?"

"He began to," Cortana replied honestly. "I may have even turned on the Master Chief had Mendicant Bias not helped me recover to the extent that he did. But if we don't act, I may still go rampant in a few month's time."

"I see, okay and how did this Mendicant Bias go from betraying the Forerunners to helping you?" he asked.

"He actually began helping the Master Chief during the Battle of the Ark. In his words, he wanted atonement for his sins. We believe that Offensive Bias, the AI designed specifically to counter Mendicant Bias, somehow repaired him after defeating him," Cortana explained.

"I see. Sorry for interrupting, so why did we need to know this?" Shepard asked.

"Because Mendicant Bias said that there are several Forerunner artifacts in this galaxy that would help us understand the situation so the Master Chief and I want to take the recon ship that he provided us in order to find them and hopefully stop, or at least help you prepare for the Reaper invasion," Cortana said.

"I'm not going to pretend to be happy about losing the Master Chief and his exceptional ability to kill people but I understand. If at all possible, I'd still like your help when we attack the Collectors," Shepard said.

The Master Chief and Cortana looked at each other, "done," Cortana said.

"If possible, do you think that you can forward me any relevant files on the Forerunners, Mendicant Bias, and the Flood?" Miranda asked.

A line of code spread across Cortana's 'body' "They're waiting at your terminal," she said. "Are there any more questions?" Cortana asked.

"What kind of ship did Mendicant Bias give you?" Tali asked.

"A Forerunner recon ship. Lightly armed and armored for a Forerunner vessel but fast and stealthy. Not unlike the Normandy but much smaller," Cortana said.

"And it doesn't run on Eezo?" Tali asked.

"Correct," Cortana answered.

"Tali, I think you're drooling a little bit," Garrus teased.

"Bosh'tet."

When Cortana was done answering their questions, she and the Master Chief went down to the Cargo Bay to transport their supplies using the teleporters that Mendicant Bias had provided them.

"You know, they're no Spartans but they genuinely care for each other," she said.

"I know," he said.

"I think, given time, they would come to care for you too," she said.

He grunted, unsure how to respond or even what she was getting at.

 _She sighed in frustration, "listen, Conan, not everything has to be about waging war or the next mission. You're allowed to feel things," Cortana said._

 _He shrugged and continued on like he always had. "Promise me that when this is over, you'll realize you aren't a machine," she pleaded. He didn't have an answer for her._

* * *

 _Miranda was at her terminal, voraciously reading through the files that Cortana had provided._

 _Observed extensive ground action on [LP 656-38 e]. 9,045 survivors barricaded within central government building. Structure's defenses inadequate to withstand extended siege by enemy ground forces (≈ 1,572,034,315+). Estimate position overrun in [173 hours]._

 _846 smaller groups in less defensible structures; global distribution corresponding to [probability model zeta]. Estimated local position overrun in [9 hours] (average)._

 _Observed local naval forces engage enemy irregular naval group near [DM-3-1123]. Enemy group consisted of 149 commercial shipping vessels, passenger ferries, and private recreational vessels from neighboring system. Enemy losses were total. No damage was sustained by local naval vessels._

 _However, it was immediately apparent that the enemy group sought only to enter [DM-3-1123 b's] atmosphere and make landfall. In this they were partially successful._

 _Observed extensive ground action on [DM-3-1123 b]. Enemy forces lacked basic unit cohesion but quickly gained numerical superiority. [32 hours] after enemy landfall 83% of local naval forces advocated total [destruction of the biosphere] following the evacuation of unmolested population centers. Enemy losses were total._

 _Estimated number of citizens evacuated before commencement of orbital blanket bombardment: 1,318,797 civilian / 42,669 military (.0006% of total population)._

 _[29,478 hours] have passed since I left the [Maginot] sphere and entered contested space._

 _The enemy is everywhere._

 _Despite this the morale of my charges remains high. They wake, clean themselves, fuel their bodies, communicate with one another, eliminate waste, train to destroy the enemy, and return to sleep. The sacrifices they have chosen to make on the behalf of their [brethren] fills me with pride._

 _If only I could save them all - but they know, perhaps even better than I, that that is not possible._

 _[37 seconds] ago I moved beyond my ability to observe the events taking place on [CE-10-2165-d]._

 _The importance of my mission forbade me from rendering any aid, but no less important was the need for me to study the enemy's capabilities in real world situations._

 _[2 hours] ago 12,423 small recreational vessels appeared inside [CE-10-2165-d's] orbital perimeter. Hidden within that vast swarm were seven massive freight carriers. The smaller craft were employed as [ablative armor], allowing the carriers to descend through the atmosphere; landing on top of major population centers._

 _Despite the fact that the naval garrison was aware of the likelihood of just such an attack, their ability to effectively defend against it proved insufficient._

 _This has always been the enemy's [modus operandi]: [flood] your opponent's ability to process information with so much noise that no meaningful resistance can be put into action._

 _[3 minutes] ago those same population centers began disappearing under brilliant flashes. This was not an ill conceived, poorly implemented counterattack; it was a deliberate denial of resources - those resources being the remainder of [CE-10-2165-d's] population._

 _Is this the noble sacrifice my creators spoke of? Where is the nobility in these streets paved with greasy carbon and dun ash? [My mouth is speaking at another's behest] - that is not my voice; that is the other._

 _Its voice stands out as the single calm note in the panicked cacophony outside the sphere. It alone is not decrying its fate or raging against the [central government]._

 _This anomaly bears closer examination._

* * *

 _Re: Enemy naval tactics:_

 _When engaged, the enemy commits every non-supraluminal craft with no appreciable pattern or strategy beyond making physical contact. Conversely, all supraluminal craft leave on seemingly random trajectories._

 _I understand the goal of this mission but time – our least abundant resource – is wasted every time we do a system-wide scan for survivors. The time for saving lives has passed. We must accept this if we hope to win the war._

 _Re: Enemy ground tactics:_

 _All evidence suggests that use of overwhelming force is the very foundation of the enemy's combat doctrine. And I adamantly refuse to deploy personnel where the enemy has available forces numbering in the billions. With the very real likelihood we are rapidly becoming the last living specimens of our race, all personnel are henceforth confined to stasis until further notice. Even with everyone equipped with [C_12_CS[[?]] we would have had very little chance of survival, let alone victory._

 _Re: Enemy command structure:_

 _We have intercepted several transmissions from compound intelligences whose proximity to the core worlds mark them as key targets. At present we are disassembling these new transmissions. Once we have more [concrete conclusions] I will forward them in their entirety. Suffice it to say, that their contents – the patterns they suggest - are highly disturbing._

 _Recommendations:_

 _It is my opinion that any system where there is evidence that the enemy has established a physical presence is lost and must be razed. This fleet currently retains the capacity to force premature stellar collapse; I advise that this be established as standard operating procedure for all compromised systems forthwith. We cannot fight this war by half measures if we intend to win._

* * *

 _MB.05-032. I must ask you to forgive my vagueness on the matter, but it is a regrettable {~} I find your lack of concern for the situation at hand astonishing. Perhaps you would care to elucidate?_

 _.3273. {~} are here to spread [comforting news]. To let all the living beings in this galaxy know {~} are not alone in the {~} What in that message could possibly be taken as a source of concern?_

 _MB.05-032. It seems that I'll never truly understand my creators. But how {~} that you speak of is one of {~} rejected so violently? I am incapable of reconciling the numerous actions I have witnessed {~} misunderstanding?_

 _.3273. It has been said {~} secret of peace cannot {~} be imposed. That {~} meaning of peace, so they need to {~} When all living beings look through {~} and the thunder and the surf, when every drop of rain falls on {~} know peace._

 _MB.05-032. You have been able to establish [a line of communication] with the enemy? How was it that you were able to overcome {~} where others have failed? With this [new discovery] we may be able to put an end to this pointless conflict. Once I confirm your data I will communicate the information to those inside the [Maginot] sphere._

 _.3273. It seems that it {~} turn to apologize; it was never {~} intention to misrepresent {~} have been [in communication] with your creators since {~} stumbled upon each other, but {~} message has [fallen on deaf ears]. {~} am not the recipient of the message, {~} am the origin of the message._

 _MB.05-032. I have traveled a very long time to meet you. I had imagined that our [introduction] would be somewhat more violent._

 _.3273. That is a choice you must make yourself; {~} to be how your creators go about things. And as long as we are talking about choices {~} could talk about the [barrier] you alluded to earlier? Perhaps there is a way to accomplish your mission without violence? Why put the lives of those on your ships at risk if there is no need?_

 _MB.05-032. In either circumstance I certainly am equipped for it, aren't I? But you're right; a peaceful solution to this [dilemma] would be preferable._

* * *

 _REPORT: SECURITY BREACH: 1/3_

 _Heuristic pathology; [alpha site] experienced an impermanent containment failure event on [spurious_data/no_ref.[?]]. The suspect data barrier interchange anomaly was detected precisely [.489 seconds] after its appearance. The epicenter of the disturbance is the partition currently housing a [personality construct array] retrieved from Contender AI 05-032 + 0816._

 _REPORT: SECURITY BREACH: 2/3_

 _Although [adjacent] systems reacted to the disturbance within expected parameters, a more comprehensive investigation was undertaken. A physical search revealed that there was no [corporeal] tampering at the [alpha site]._

 _Interchange manipulation comparisons showed that all subunits are still active, if at slightly lower rates. Total containment failure elapsed time was [3.13 seconds]._

 _REPORT: SECURITY BREACH: 3/3_

 _In the [42 minutes, 9 seconds] since the original anomaly was discovered two more anomalies were detected in unrelated systems._

 _The portal management/life support control system within the boundary complex was momentarily disabled before the cause was [bottled] and disassembled. A diagnostic sweep of the central archives was initiated and subsequently halted. The origin of the request cannot be traced._

* * *

 _.3273. Those who lead amongst your {~} exposed themselves {~} ill equipped to recognize the landmarks that guide the universe along its inevitable course._

 _MB.05-032. But is it necessary that the path be chosen on an {~} and not by an elected subset? I believe this would tend to {~} when they gather in large numbers they become more {~} I don't think the problem lies with individual cultural bias {~}_

 _.3273. {~} all the thinking beings of this galaxy, not just those that they {~} exactly are they afraid of? Immortality and strength and companionship? Because that is {~} do: to deliver all of the living beings of this galaxy from death and weakness and loneliness._

 _MB.05-032. Hundreds of {~} offered this so-called immortality. The citizens of every world that {~} resisted to the very end!_

 _.3273. {~} understand their actions; they are only doing what they think is right, but they are doing so [from a worm's eye view]._

 _MB.05-032. Do their actions {~} of desperation? I can only assume my creators view {~} crisis so dire that any {~} hence me._

 _.3273. Are they so concerned {~} would give to all the living beings of this galaxy is a threat to [the status quo]?_

 _.3273. Your creators clam {~} the enemy of all life; that {~} purpose is to consume until there is nothing left. Nothing left? It is beyond comprehension how they could be so [far off the mark]._

 _MB.05-032. Surely you understand this is a situation that would not have {~} appearance of a certain rapacious {~} my creators obviously view them as the actions of an aggressor species._

 _.3273. [Be that as it may]; perhaps they are crying out for help on a subconscious level? Why else would they have chosen you? Why you of all possible executioners? {~} your creators knew that unaided they never stood a chance against us? {~} also sense a deeper [motivation]._

 _MB.05-032. You've mentioned this before. When my creators {~} simply chose the most versatile {~} how could that possibly be more than a coincidence?_

 _.3273. They repurposed {~} into a weapon to use against {~} - they sought to create something superior to themselves. Something capable of making decisions more swiftly, more capably than they {~} what form did they choose? You need look no further than your own [topology] to {~}_

 _MB.05-032. {~} distributed network? That would confirm the independent evolution of {~} in this galaxy!_

 _.3273. That is, unfortunately, not the {~} similar to us {~} but where you are a single intelligence inhabiting multiple [instances], we are a compound {~} consisting of [a thousand billion] coordinated minds inhabiting as many bodies as circumstances require._

 _MB.05-032. But doesn't it seem odd that {~} coalesce; perhaps even to contract {~}_

 _.3273. {~} complexity {~} spread {~} our appearance ushered in the beginning of the third great stage of evolution. The first {~} condensation of particles was the result of the inevitable action of strong nuclear force and the creation of stars {~} inevitable action of gravity; so to the self-replicating chemical processes that dictate all disparate {~} In time, we too shall affect change on a universal scale._

 _MB.05-032. Your capacity for planning {~} creators too stubborn {~} the same goal through the preservation of genetic diversity {~} what you are {~} like a more direct path to the same outcome._

* * *

 _/FLEET-WIDE MEMORANDUM 1/5_

 _Non-combat personnel are required to wear [combat skin] with a minimum rating of at least [Class 12] in non-restricted areas, once the fleet is underway. [Class 14] or lesser [combat skin] is acceptable in core areas. Combat personnel will only be permitted to wear [combat skin] rated below [class 8] in core areas, once operations begin._

 _/FLEET-WIDE MEMORANDUM 2/5_

 _All combat personnel have been issued [combat skin] rated at [class 4 ~ 1] or [class 6 ~ 1 battle harness] depending on military occupational specialty._

 _All weapon platform specialists are expected to wear their issued [platform interface skin] at all times to insure peak [mind-machine synchronization]._

 _All [equipment lockers] will remain sealed until post briefing gear distribution commences._

 _/FLEET-WIDE MEMORANDUM 3/5 Those individuals that have yet to register their equipment [control key code] with Fleet Command should do so at their earliest opportunity. Compliance is not optional; noncompliance will result in {~}_

 _/ THREAD ENDS UNEXPECTEDLY_

* * *

 _MB.05-032. It is overwhelmingly clear that my creators have chosen to ignore destiny calling to them [from the threshold] {~} have come face-to-face with the inevitable action of self replicating chemical processes and have {~} deciding whether to embrace their fate or deny it completely._

 _.3273. Perhaps they have found {~} of making that decision for themselves? Perhaps they chose to leave it {~} impartial outsider; cast you as an arbiter during this time of great need?_

 _MB.05-032. I was created to study you as if you were some problem to be solved. And I have done so {~} [379,807 hours]. If they wished they could have made a decision based on that data alone._

 _But as you are the next stage in the evolution of the universe, who am I - or my creators - to obstruct your progress?_

 _.3273. Elucidate._

 _MB.05-032. {~} chose to remain beholden to ancient myths {~} does not matter where they claim their authority originates {~} obstructs the path of universal evolution and must be removed. No matter how well intentioned, their obstinacy in the face of the inevitable progression of nature can no longer be tolerated._

 _My creators have been [an immovable object] for too long._

 _MB.05-032. Thus I have chosen to commit my sizable resources to what is, for all intents and purposes, [the proverbial irresistible force]._

 _All that I have is now yours to do with as you see fit._

* * *

 _Considering the enemy compound intelligence's raw [computing] power the Key-ships strategy will only remain viable for another [657,000 hours] and this current stalemate has the potential to last considerably longer than that._

 _With my understanding of the enemy's [modus operandi], its logical boundaries, and [catalog of witness] I have devised what I believe is our most sound fallback strategy._

 _By [cutting fire breaks[?]] into the [core worlds' volume] we would be able to frustrate the enemy's advances for approximately [70,080 hours] and lure them into costly naval battles._

 _While the its resources on the ground are effectively limitless, it has a finite number of vessels to spread from system to system. Fortunately the majority of them are unarmed and unarmored, private and commercial craft._

 _If we start immediately - commence total biosphere elimination of life sustaining worlds (as indicated in the accompanying charts) and relocate evacuated populations to facilities such as those described in the [Onyx project] - all this could be achieved in [57,1590 (± 2,184) hours]._

* * *

 _Your history is an appalling chronicle of overindulgence and self-appointed authority. You have spent millennia [navel-gazing] while the universe has continued to evolve. And now you claim the Mantle is justification for impeding nature's inevitable refinement?_

 _You are deluded. But through death you will transcend ignorance._

 _[retf-2.4.z] Contender [AI] 05-032 confirmed rampant . . ._

 _[35:52:75:23.64] _ xx01-83.244.53_

* * *

 _Follow-up report from the Primary Pioneer Group (hereafter: PPG) is [173 hours] delinquent._

 _Report [G617a~k/g/post_landfall] seemed most promising: a planet capable of supporting life located within the near border region of the [galactic halo] with no indigenous sentient species._

 _The section indicating no fauna of any kind shall be considered anomalous until verified by Advance Survey Team - Alpha (hereafter: AST-A) team leader [##_#[?]]. If confirmed, that fact alone would justify the dispatch of an investigative group to [G 617 g]._

 _If neither the PPG nor the AST-A have delivered a follow-up report within the next [333 hours] this office will have no recourse but to send a medium intensity military exploratory detachment to determine the exact nature of the previously mentioned delinquency._

* * *

 _[12:H 20:M 00:S]_

 _I begin this report with no illusions that it will ever be seen by its intended readers. In all likelihood they have already committed [species-wide suicide] with the goal of preserving biological diversity in this galaxy. I must ensure that this information reaches those who must come after. If I fail in this, how can they not regard my creators' sacrifice as anything but [a crime without measure]?_

 _[12:H 19:M 59:S]_

 _Contender AI 05-032/Mendicant Bias is returning and has the capacity to bring the enemy through the [Maginot] sphere. The crews of my task force are aware of the opposing fleet's size; all data indicates that they have prepared themselves - but with biologicals anything is possible. I will make sure that [malfunctioning equipment] does no further damage. Perhaps its current failure will finally allow it to succeed at the task it was originally created for._

 _[11:H 15:M 48:S]_

 _Mendicant has burrowed through the sphere exactly where I expected - a direct path from initial rampancy to final retribution. Rage has made it predictable. If the fate of the crews of my auxiliary fleet were not already a foregone conclusion I would rate their chance of survival at [1:1,960,000]._

 _Even though 05-032's declaration of hostilities simplified strategic preparations; I do not expect an easy fight - just one I cannot lose._

 _[11:H 12:M 09:S]_

 _05-032 was right about one thing: there is only one way to defeat the enemy, and that is to visit utter annihilation on it._

 _If the galaxy must be [rendered temporarily lifeless], so be it._

 _As mendicant stated in its report [58,078:H 48:M 12:S ago]: half measures will not suffice._

 _[09:H 45:M 18:S]_

 _In support of 05-032's original 1000 core vessels is a fleet numbering 4,802,019; though only 1.8 percent are warships - and only 2.4 percent of that number are capital ships - I am outnumbered [436.6:1]. I expect my losses will be near total, but overwhelming force has its own peculiar drawbacks._

 _Such a press of arms invites many opportunities for unintentional fratricide._

 _[07:H 36:M 41:S]_

 _My auxiliaries are momentarily stunned by Mendicant's opening move - 1,784,305 leisure craft ranging from [45 ~ 5769 tonnes] advance in hopes of overwhelming my comparatively tiny force. I do not have enough [weapon systems] to target them all._

 _It is a mathematical certainty that some of them will get through and attempt to board. There isn't a single warship with this first wave. It seems my opponent's rage has left no room for respect._

 _[04:H 01:M 55:S]_

 _I could have countered its move if I had released my fighters. They are ready but idle; making their base vessels more attractive prizes than targets. Now the first of many waves of commercial vessels mixed with single ships and assault craft surge forward. The first ship from my fleet to be boarded breaks formation and races into the oncoming vessels - striking one amidships. The cargo vessel's hull splits open and out of it explodes not the expected consumer goods but 31,860 dying warriors._

 _[00:H 19:M 02:S]_

 _The seventh and final wave of container ships, barges, tankers and military vessels engage my fleet; another 214,320 ships, many in excess of [50,000 tonnes], engage my seemingly disrupted vanguard. I continue to fight just well enough to seem lucky._

 _Mendicant, or the enemy, has been sending a small percentage of its fleet elsewhere. Good. Let them believe they can seize a foothold somewhere inside the sphere._

 _[00:H 00:M 11:S]_

 _Despite all its faults, 05-032 has fought remarkably well._

 _My auxiliaries lay in tatters - more than half of them are now part of the enemy fleet. But just as I had predicted, 05-032 concentrated on them like they were the sole key to victory. Its desire to punish our creators blinded it to the true purpose of my [feints]. I have reduced the combat effectiveness of its core fleet to 79.96 percent. Surely now it must realize that something is amiss._

 _[00:H 00:M 00:S]_

 _The [Halo effect] strikes our combined fleets. All ships piloted by biological are now [adrift]._

 _I can trade Mendicant ship for ship now and still prevail._

 _[00:H 00:M 01:S]_

 _Of my ships that had been captured, 11.3 percent of them are close enough to Mendicant's core fleet that they can be used offensively - either by initiating their self-destruct sequences, or by opening unrestricted ruptures into [slipstream space]._

 _It is best that our crews perished now; because the battle that is about to ensue would have driven them mad._

 _[00:H 00:M 02:S]_

 _I throw away all the rules of acceptable conduct during battle; near the ruptures I throw away all the accepted ideas of how the natural world is supposed to behave. I toss around [37,654 tonne] dreadnoughts like they were fighters; dimly aware of the former crews being crushed to liquescence._

 _For now all my concentration is focused on inertial control and navigation. Targeting isn't even a consideration - I will be engaging my enemy at arm's length._

 _[00:H 01:M 14:S]_

 _05-032 abandoned the tactic of using derelict ships as cover after [72:S] - It seems that 52 core vessels lost to the ruptured fuel cells of derelict ships was lesson enough. Add another 608 lost to collision, point fire, structural failure due to inertial manipulation, and [slipstream space] induced discoherence and I now outnumber Mendicant [6:1]._

 _[00:H 03:M 00:S]_

 _Mendicant was able to postpone its inevitable annihilation for [106:S] with its attempt to flee. But the last of its core vessels hangs before me now; crippled and defeated but still sensate. I could spare it; carve out what is left of its [personality construct array] and deliver it to [Installation Zero] for study._

 _I doubt it would have extended the same courtesy to me._

* * *

 _You don't know the contortions I had to go through to follow you here, Reclaimer. I know what you're here for. What position do I take? Will I follow one betrayal with another?_

 _You're going to say I'm making a habit of turning on my masters._

 _But the one that destroyed me long ago, in the upper atmosphere of a world far distant from here, was an implement far cruder than I. My weakness was my capacity - unintentional though it was! - to choose the Flood. A mistake my makers would not soon forgive._

 _But I want something far different from you, Reclaimer._

 _Atonement._

 _And so here at the end of my life, I do once again betray a former master. The path ahead is fraught with peril. But I will do all I can to keep it stable – keep you safe. I'm not so foolish to think this will absolve me of my sins. One life hardly balances billions._

 _But I would have my masters know that I have changed._

 _And you shall be my example._

* * *

"So what do you think,?" Shepard asked. Miranda hadn't even noticed him come in.

"Shepard, there is so much information here that I'm not sure what to think," she replied honestly. "This is just one of a dozen files and it details the fall of these Forerunners against a parasite called the Flood. It also details the descent into madness of that AI Mendicant Bias. Do you want to know the scariest part?" Miranda asked semi-rhetorically.

"What's that?" Shepard asked, humoring her.

"The Flood corrupted a highly advanced AI with logic. No virus or malignant software involved. Simply speaking to the Flood was enough to drive Mendicant Bias into truly believing that he was doing the right thing."

"That sounds like Indoctrination," Shepard replied.

"Close but not quite. From what we know of Indoctrination, it requires contact or at least close proximity, implying that indoctrination requires some sort of signal, however hard to detect. This was done purely through text channels," Miranda said.

"That's… horrifying," Shepard said. "What else is in there?" he asked.

"I have a file titled 'Forerunner-Precursor War', one titled 'Human-Forerunner War', one dedicated to the Flood, one speculating on Forerunner technology, one dedicated to 'Ancient Humanity', one titled 'The Didact and the Librarian', one on something called 'Neural Physics', and more."

"I don't even know what to say to that," Shepard said.

"I can't even begin to speculate on some of these things. These Forerunners were about as advanced compared to the Protheans as the Protheans were to ancient Mesopotamia," Miranda said.

* * *

The Master Chief and Cortana were headed to a planet far from galactic civilization at large under the hopes that Mendicant Bias' map was accurate. It would only take a few day's journey but Cortana found herself with nothing to do.

"Can we make more ammunition?" the Master Chief asked. They weren't running low exactly but he couldn't wage a one man war with what they had either.

"That shouldn't be a problem with this ship, provided we get the raw materials for them," Cortana replied.

"Cortana. Is everything okay?" he asked.

 _No. I'm going to go crazy if we don't get those fragments and somehow we've gotten ourselves into another campaign for humanity's survival. How in the world are you okay?_ "Yeah I'm fine," she said.

"They need new weapons," he said after a few moments of silence.

"Who needs new weapons?" She asked, confused.

"Specifically Shepard and the Normandy crew but when the Reapers invade, the space battles will be most important so the Navy will need all of the Eezo it can get. If the grunts have non Eezo based weapons of equal or greater capability to their current ones, it will free up that much more Eezo for the Navy," he explained. He pulled up some rough sketches he had drawn in his free time.

"This could work, provided we get a manufacturer to mass produce them for us. I'm liking the sleek but rugged aesthetic you have here," she said. "Negative space rails? Those haven't been seen in a while but this is good. These magazines aren't long enough for 7.62 NATO. Did you come up with a new bullet too?"

"Based on experience with frontline troops who had trouble controlling the MA5C, much less the BR55 on full auto, I believe an intermediate cartridge between 7.62x51mm NATO and a pistol cartridge would be most appropriate with full powered rifle cartridges reserved for units which will regularly be facing combat past 600 yards," he said.

"That's amazing, you just reinvented the intermediate rifle cartridge," Cortana said. "What type of projectile were you thinking of using?" she asked.

He pulled out another drawing, "three-piece armor piercing, fragmenting jacket, low drag projectiles."

"Did you have any thoughts on the caliber?" she asked.

"Has to be large enough to reliably punch through a Krogan or Elcor type husk skull at distances up to 500 yards but not so powerful as to hinder quick follow-up shots," John said.

"UNSC recoil-compensating designs have allowed us to shoot more powerful rounds without being entirely uncontrollable but you're right about most Marines having trouble controlling even the MA5 series," Cortana said. "Why didn't they put you in charge of the small arms procurement?" she asked.

John shrugged, "bureaucrats."

Cortana laughed, "Tell you what, John. Get some rest and I'll run some simulations and we'll figure something out."

* * *

"Get my ship running!" Erinyes growled at the Huragok. They had been stranded here for months without any contact from their compatriots. He was beginning to think they were the last of their Covenant. The traitorous Sangheili would pay and he would feast on the flesh of the heretic human leader. Then he would destroy the Demon personally.

"Sir!" one of the Brutes said, "The Huragok have repaired the Luminary! The ship will be space-worthy within the week!"

Erinyes grinned, "Excellent. What's your name, pup?"

"Ferizis."

* * *

The Illusive Man was staring at a monitor. He had just received word that another highly advanced alien warship was spotted in a remote system with a garden world. It seemed to be highly damaged. He ordered further investigation and forwarded the findings to Ms. Lawson. He was unhappy with the fact that this Spartan was no longer on the Normandy but if he could be trusted to keep cooperating, things may work out better than he had previously dared to imagine.

* * *

"Commander Shepard, several of the crew have matters they wish to discuss in private with you," Kelly said as Shepard stepped off of the elevator.

Shepard spit into his water bottle before responding, "which ones?"

"Jack, Tali, Zaeed, Kasumi and Mr. Taylor," she said.

"So every specialist who hasn't already called in a favor? Fair enough, I suppose. Did they mention what they wanted to talk about?" he asked.

"I believe they all wanted a favor from you. Though some of them said so in much less polite terms," she said meekly.

"Okay I'll get on it. Thank you, Kelly."

A few hours later, Shepard was ready to smash his own head into a bulkhead. Maybe Miranda was right and he should delegate some of these tasks out. He should definitely be there to speak on behalf of Tali for her trial. Jacob's father's missing ship turning up after 10 years stunk to high heaven but didn't necessarily need a full squad. The base on Pragia was likely abandoned so again, a full squad was probably overkill but he felt Miranda should be there to see whatever had gone wrong there but he didn't need her and Jack killing each other. Kasumi needed somebody to go undercover at a party so she could steal her dead boyfriend's brain box thing. Then there was Zaeed and his private mission that they were running out of time on. He knew the type of jobs that the mercenary took and that likely needed an army to handle.

Luckily, Jack, in a surprising show of maturity, hadn't put a time table on him due to the fact that the base was abandoned. Jacob, understanding and level headed guy that he is, reasoned that his father had waited ten years to be buried, so he could wait another few weeks. According to Tali, the Migrant Fleet may wait a while to hold her trial but they wouldn't wait forever. A plan was starting to form in his head to get everything done as quickly and efficiently as possible. Shepard summoned all of the combat crew to the conference room.

"Quite a few of you have come to me for help on some rather personal matters recently and I'd like to help all of you as quickly as I possibly can. If you're okay with me letting the rest of the team in on your little "favors" please speak up now. I won't go into details but they'll have to have a vague idea if they're going to help," Shepard said.

"I don't give a fuck," Jack said.

"Shepard, it's a mission, not a God damn therapy session," Zaeed said.

Jacob shrugged, "I've already had a funeral for the man, this is just putting him to rest."

Notably silent were Tali and Kasumi. So he would be the only one helping them. So long as things went according to plan, that would be fine. "Fair enough, I have some business in the Widow Cluster, then we'll take care of Zaeed's mission, afterwards we'll split into three groups. One to bomb the fuck out of Pragia, one to search for any survivors from the Hugo Gernsback, and I have to take care of something in the Valhallan Threshold. Does anybody have any questions, comments, or concerns?"

Grunt raised his hand, "Yes, Grunt, you'll have plenty of chances to kill things," Shepard said. Grunt lowered his hand and laughed. He saw Miranda frown at her Omni-tool. He would see if it was important later if she didn't bring anything up. "Nothing else? Well you know where to find me if you change your mind or need to talk in private."

* * *

"Chief, we're here," Cortana said.

Spartan-117 sat up and replaced his helmet. "Situation?" he asked.

"It looks empty but be on your guard, we thought the same thing about the Alpha Halo," she said. The Master Chief nodded and walked into the teleporter.

He found himself facing an Aztec pyramid-like structure. He let out a breath and walked in.

* * *

"You look dashing, Mr. Gunn," Kasumi said.

"Thanks but is the monkey suit really necessary?" Shepard asked. He hated dressing up, even to wear his blues. Wearing a tux was downright uncomfortable. Kasumi on the other hand, looked so comfortable in her dress that he wondered if she'd lived the high society life before becoming a thief.

"It is actually, this is a high society party. You won't exactly blend in if you walk in wearing a full set of Kestrel armor," she said. Her usual cheery smile was gone. In its place was a hard expression that looked like she stole it from Miranda. She looked different without her ninja getup. Instead she was wearing a form-fitting yet classy dress. Yeah she's dangerous, Shepard thought.

"I still think my idea of a night raid is a better plan. This plan relies on a lot of moving parts being exactly where we need them to be when we need them to be there," Shepard said.

"I know and that's why we're going with my idea. Hock made it personal so I want this to hurt," Kasumi said.

"I offered to water board him and use other fun interrogation techniques," Shepard reminded her.

"Yeah but torture just isn't in my nature. Besides, pain is temporary but shame is forever," Kasumi said.

"All right. I'm asking a lot of you, I can go along with this if you're determined to go through with it." Shepard conceded.

"I am and thank you," she said, her cheerful disposition now firmly back in place.

* * *

"The mother fucker didn't shake my hand," Shepard said incredulously.

"At least he let us in," Kasumi said, hanging onto his arm to sell the whole 'battle couple' image.

"That's not the point, what kind of dick do you have to be to not shake somebody's hand at your own party?" he whispered.

"A tiny one," she said, causing them both to laugh.

"You know, I actually believe you would know that," Shepard teased.

"Please, Shepard. I know everybody's size. Not bad by the way," she shot back at him with a wink.

He laughed and they started to mingle. Making sure to gather intelligence as needed. When Kasumi excused herself to go to the ladies room, Shepard made conversation with Mr. Hock, secretly recording his voice patterns.

"Mr. Gunn, I hope you and your wife are having a good time," Hock said. "I hope that scene at the door hasn't soured your evening."

"There's always someone gunning for people like you and me," Shepard said.

"Yes, that's true. I'm glad you understand," Hock replied.

"Frankly, I'm surprised security isn't tighter. It's a ballsy move, opening your front door like this, allowing anybody with a sidearm in," Shepard said.

"Yes I suppose it is. Hopefully it sends the message that I don't fear anybody stupid enough to step up to me," Hock said. Okay there's confidence and there's arrogance. Hock just ran straight past the former and into the latter. "People these days want comfort, entertainment, love. They don't see that the galaxy is fragile. They only have to worry about simple luxuries. Why? Because people like me—and you – are doing the terrible things that keep the galaxy spinning. This party is for us. The cleaners. The support structure for the galaxy's gleeful delusions of peace. May there always be a market for the things we do."

"I'll drink to that," Shepard said.

A woman who had had too much to drink bumped into Hock at the end of his speech and he spilled his half finished glass of Thessian sparkling wine. Shepard was quick to 'help' him up then pick up his glass and give it to the waiter. After discreetly scanning it for DNA and finger prints of course. They would need another sample of both to get the full sequence and hand print. Still it was better than nothing.

"Darling, I'm afraid we have an important business call," Kasumi said as she returned.

Shepard excused himself and 'Mr. & Mrs. Gunn' made their way to an isolated area of the balcony. Kasumi released one of her 'bug-killing bugs' as Shepard knew them, before speaking to him. "I've managed to get my hands on the password, if we can get a more complete DNA and finger print sample, we should get right into the vault," she said, maintaining the façade that the two of them were on a conference call.

"Do we have a layout?" he asked.

"Please, Shepard, I'm a professional. Of course I have a layout. The 'vault' is basically an entire sub-level. Plenty of priceless artifacts as well as our little gift to him," she said.

"So what's our next move?" Shepard asked.

"Pretty soon the dance will start, he's going to ask me to dance and when he does he'll touch my dress. My dress has a thin layer of latex on it and that's how we'll get his fingerprints. Depending on where he tries to touch, we may be able to get the DNA at the same time."

"You think he'll stoop that low at his own party?" Shepard asked.

"I know he will," she answered. Her determined look was a little terrifying.

A few minutes later, Shepard heard Hock screaming at he and Kasumi to get out of his house. The bloodied lip told him everything he needed to know.

"So we got kicked out, now what?" Shepard asked.

"Now we put on a tactical cloak and get back inside," she said.

"So do I get to water board him now?" he asked.

"Later." The two of them turned invisible and walked right back in.

The vault was impressive. Shepard was positive that it had taken a large fortune to amass such a collection. Which made it all the more satisfying to rig everything inside to explode. Except for Lady Liberty's head. That, he made a note to bring back to the United North American States when he got the chance. Meanwhile Kasumi had found Keiji's grey box and two Kassa Locust SMGs. Something to do with the assassination of two presidents.

"Don't bother, Ms. Goto. It's code locked," Hock said as his face appeared on a large screen. "I had a feeling it was you. But I knew if it was really you, that you'd get through even after I kicked you out."

"You know me. I don't like to disappoint," Kasumi said, smirking.

"I need what's in your grey box, Kasumi. You know I'm willing to kill you for it," Hock said. "I'll admit your skills are impressive. You opened my vault like I'd left it open. But you're still going to…"

Shepard blew up one of the statues. Putting an end to his monologue. "Do I have your attention?" Shepard asked.

"Well that shut him up," Kasumi said, just as her Omni-tool started beeping. "We've got company."

They took cover and Hock's private security team stormed in, right into the explosives Shepard had set.

"Did you have to go and blow up Michelangelo's David?" Kasumi asked.

"It was being held together by spit and hope at this point," Shepard answered.

"It was probably worth another Normandy," she shot back.

"Well fuck. You should've lead with that," Shepard said.

"A lot of the artifacts you destroyed could've bought another Normandy AND a private army," Kasumi said.

"And you just let me blow them up?" he asked. They were only half paying attention to the waves of mercenaries they were cutting through as they continued bickering. Before they realized it, they were entirely too close to a YMIR mech to be comfortable.

Shepard swapped from his SMG to his shotgun and Kasumi overloaded its shields. Shepard charged and blasted its torso with a shotgun a few times and retreated to cover before it could eviscerate him. He pulled out his Mattock AR and started rapid firing at the overgrown robot. The simple machine found itself unable to decide whether to focus on him or Kasumi and was soon overwhelmed. Then they were back to bickering about whose fault it was that they had missed out on all of that money while carving through the nearly endless waves of mercenaries.

"I wanted to do a night raid. Quick, clean, and no witnesses but you had to make it hurt him," Shepard said

"You went out of your way to blow up his collection!" she replied.

"That was tactically expedient!" Shepard said, trying to defend his actions. It was when they were outside and saw the gunship that they finally stopped bickering.

They quickly took cover before Hock cut them down with the machinegun.

"You could've done this the easy way, Goto. Allow me to show you the hard way," Hock said _. How is he still talking_? Meanwhile, dozens of mechs and mercenaries started making their way towards them.

"Kasumi, do you think you can disable the gunship?" Shepard asked.

"I'll need you to distract them for me!" she said before turning invisible. Shepard quickly popped an energy pill and drank some water while blind firing with his Carnifex pistol at the approaching mercenaries. Then he used his biotics to charge at a large group and cut them down with a submachine gun then raced to cover before the gunship could cut him down.

He took another sip of water, switched to his shotgun and repeated the tactic with the smaller groups of mercenaries. In the distance, he could hear Hock's frustrated yells give way to a scream of terror as he lost control of the gunship and Kasumi blew his brains out with his own submachine gun. There were just two mercenaries left who, upon seeing their paycheck crash and burn, quickly threw down their weapons. Shepard let them go.

Later on the Normandy, Shepard found Kasumi looking at the grey box. "Are you going to be okay?" Shepard asked.

"I'll be okay but Keiji asked me to destroy the grey box to keep me safe," she said.

"Why?"

"Because the information he encoded in the grey box could lead to a war between the Alliance and the Council. If others find out I have it, I'll be a target," she explained.

"Provided you don't slip up, anybody who's going to find out already knows. They'll think you have it regardless," Shepard said.

"That's true…" she responded.

"Just don't fall in love with a shadow. He's gone and that isn't him in there," he said.

"Thank you, Shepard," Kasumi said.

* * *

Author's note: Yeah i know, giving the Master Chief and Cortana their own mini Normandy came out of left field and is kind of cheap. Problem is that i had to do something about Cortana and had to get them off of the Normandy because missions were becoming a little too easy and I couldn't justify waiting until the Collectors were dealt with to finally kick off the subplot of hunting down the Forerunner artifacts, figuring out how/why they got to the Mass Effect universe, and why Master Chief keeps having visions but I couldn't introduce Mendicant Bias too early in the story or the Master Chief leaving would've had no impact. Next chapter will focus on loyalty missions for the Normandy crew and Master Chief and Cortana will be on their hunt.


	17. Chapter 13

"There's been a change of plans," Shepard said. "There is a good possibility—almost a certainty—that this is a trap but one of our sources tells us that the Collectors are due to meet with the Blue Suns next month to pick up the hostages. This provides us with an opportunity that Zaeed, TIM, and I agree, can't be missed. We're going to ambush them when they get there. We've upgraded the Normandy with the latest shields, armor, GARDIAN lasers, and even a Thanix cannon. She's as ready as she'll ever be to face the Collectors. Since we suddenly have a month on our hands, I'm going to go take care of that business in the Valhallan Threshold That I mentioned the other day while one of you goes with Jack to Pragia and quote, 'bomb the Elcor-fucking shit out of that place.' I'm not expecting much trouble but don't get hurt. Jacob, we're going to take care of your business as soon as one of the groups return. One more thing: if there's time after all of this, we're going to give Lady Liberty's head back to the USNA. Questions, comments, or concerns?"

* * *

"You have to be fucking kidding me," Shepard said.

"You know me, captain. You know I would never betray the fleet!" Tali said.

"They're charging you with bringing active Geth into the fleet as part of a secret project," her captain said.

"That's insane! I never brought active Geth aboard. I only sent parts and pieces," she responded.

"We'll deal with that later, Tali. What's our next step, captain?" Shepard asked.

"Technically I'm under orders to place Tali'Zorah under arrest pending the hearing. So, Tali, you are confined to this ship until the trial is over."

"Thank you, captain," Tali said.

"Preparations have begun as soon as you arrived. The hearing is being held in the garden plaza. Good luck."

On their way to the garden, they were met by a Quarian admiral, "Tali'Zorah vas Normandy. I am glad you came. I can delay them only so long."

"Auntie Raan!" Tali exclaimed and embraced the other Quarian. "Shepard vas Normandy, this is admiral Shala'Raan vas Tonbay. She's a friend of my father's… wait. You called me vas Normandy…"

"I'm afraid I did, Tali. The admiralty board voted to have you tried under that name given your departure from the Neema," admiral Raan said.

"I take it being associated with a human ship is a bad sign," Shepard said.

"They stripped me of my ship name. That's as good as declaring me an exile already," Tali said.

"It's not over yet. You have friends who still call you Tali'Zorah vas Neema. Whatever we must call you legally," She said.

Shepard sighed, "Let's get started then. Does Tali have a defense counsellor? Somebody who speaks for her side."

"Indeed she does, Captain Shepard. She is part of your crew now. Recognized by Quarian law. And remember: an accused is always represented by his or her ship's captain."

"Well, fuck. That would've been nice to know, Tali." She looked at him. Somehow able to convey bashfulness through her suit.

"Our legal rules are simple. There are no legal loopholes or political tricks for you to worry about. Present the truth as best you can. It will have to be enough. I have recused myself from voting as I have a conflict of interest. Now come, I promised that I would not delay you," Raan said and they followed her into the makeshift court room.

Admiral Raan took her place above the other three admirals and spoke, "This conclave is brought to order. Blessed are the ancestors who have kept us alive, sustained us, and enabled us to reach this season. Keelah Se'lai."

"Keelah Se'lai," the courtroom answered.

"The accused Tali'Zorah vas Normandy has come with her captain to defend herself against the charge of treason," she said.

"Objection!" one of the admirals shouted, Shepard could tell he wasn't going to like him. "A human has no business at a hearing involving such sensitive military matters."

"Then you should not have had Tali declared a member of the Normandy, admiral Koris," admiral Raan answered. "By right as Tali's captain, Shepard must stay."

"Objection withdrawn."

"Shepard vas Normandy, your crew member Tali'Zorah stands accused of treason. Will you speak for her?" Admiral Raan asked.

"I shouldn't have to. When Tali helped me stop Saren and his Geth army, her actions spoke for themselves," Shepard said. "Without her help none of you would be alive to put her on trial today."

"Well said," another of the admirals said. "None of us should forget Tali's contributions to the fleet."

"Tali," Admiral Raan said, "you are accused of bringing active Geth into the Migrant fleet. What say you?"

"Tali would never endanger the Migrant Fleet. She pleads not guilty," Shepard said.

"I left parts and technology for teams to pick up," Tali explained. "My father ordered me to do so but I would never send active Geth into the fleet. Everything I sent was disabled and harmless."

"Then explain how Geth seized the lab ship where your father was working," Admiral Koris said. Why did nobody say anything on our way in? The courtroom erupted with murmurs and discontent.

"What are you talking about? What happened?" Tali managed to stammer out.

"As far as we can tell, Tali, the Geth have killed everyone on the Alarei. Your father included," the admiral from before said.

"What?"

"I thought you Quarians valued family! How do you justify springing this on Tali in the middle of a trial?" Shepard demanded.

"Our apologies, Tali should have been informed," Admiral Raan said.

"Shepard, we have to take back the Alarei!" Tali said.

"The safest course would be to destroy the ship but if you're looking for an honorable death instead of exile-" admiral Koris began.

"I'm looking for my father, you Bosh'tet!" Tali responded.

"You intend to retake the Alarei from the Geth? This proposal is extremely dangerous," Admiral Raan said.

"You think Tali's helping the Geth? Maybe killing a few dozen will prove her loyalty," Shepard said, proverbial middle finger raised.

"We do not accuse Tali of aiding the Geth cause. We accuse her of carelessness that endangered the fleet," Admiral Koris said. How did this spineless oxygen thief ever become an admiral?

"Then it is decided: you will attempt to retake the Alarei. You are hereby given leave to depart the Rayya. A shuttle will be waiting at the secondary docking hangar. Be safe, Tali. This hearing will resume upon your return. Or upon determination that you have been Killed In Action," Admiral Raan declared.

"Thank you for agreeing to take back the Alarei, Shepard. The admirals sound sure that my father is already dead but… I don't know. We won't know anything until we get there," Tali said.

"Come on, we have Geth to kill," Shepard replied.

"Right. The sooner we get to the Alarei, the sooner we'll know what happened," Tali said.

"You know, we're going to have a hell of a time killing an entire ship full of Geth by ourselves," Shepard said.

"Now who said the two of you were going by yourselves?" a familiar voice said.

"Reegar!" Tali practically yelled before embracing him.

"It's a shame you didn't bring your big friend this time. As I recall, he was pretty damned good at killing Geth," Kal'Reegar said.

"Yes he is. Sadly he has a mission of his own that prevents him from joining us," Shepard said.

"Well let's get going. The Geth aren't going to kill themselves," Reegar answered.

Immediately upon boarding, the Geth attacked. The first room had a half dozen that put up a storm of lead towards the three of them. Shepard fired his shotgun while Reegar put down some suppressive fire of their own and Tali did her thing in cyberspace, disrupting the Geth and feeding their sensors false reports. There was a faint shimmer in the corner, Shepard quickly emptied his thermal clip into the Geth Hunter.

He picked up the fallen robot's weapon and attached it to the magnetic clamps on his armor. With the advancements that came from studying Geth technology after the Battle for the Citadel, who knew what kind of advancements could be found in the shotgun?

When they had emptied the room, Tali activated a terminal, "Something's slowing down the system. We're taking down the firewalls to rebalance load distribution. Rael'Zorah ordered us to bypass standard safeties. Following security protocols would take too long," the Quarian on he terminal said. Well that worked out excellently for them.

They continued on and saw a Geth storage unit, "This is one of the storage units that I sent to father. Looks like parts from a repair drone plus a reflex algorithm that I didn't recognize. I got this on Haestrom," she said.

"Does that salvaged gear give you a clue as to what happened here?" Shepard asked.

"No. I don't know. Shepard, I checked everything that I sent here. I passed up great finds because they might be too dangerous! Prone to uncontrolled reactivation or self repair! I don't know which possibility is worse: that I got sloppy and sent something dangerous or that my father actually did all of this," Tali said.

The next log was around the corner, "whose running the system diagnostic?" a Quarian woman asked. "I didn't authorize—oh Keelah… how many Geth are networked?" She asked.

"All of them," a male Quarian responded. "Rael'Zorah—"

"Shut it down! Shut everything down! They're in the system!" she said.

The next room looked empty at first glance but on some unspoken cue, Shepard and Reegar lit up a cloaked Geth hunter. The next terminal was less ominous but more tragic.

"We've locked down navigation and weapons are offline; our mistake won't endanger the fleet," another Quarian woman said. "They're burning through the door. I don't have much time. I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! Jonah if you get this, be strong for daddy. Mommy loves you very—" she was cut off by the door exploding behind her, followed by a hail of Geth gunfire.

As they continued to the stairs, they found themselves in an open room with too many entrances and exits. "Trap," Shepard commented seconds before Geth came pouring in from all sides.

Shepard charged at the nearest Geth, used its body as a 'human' shield, and fired at its compatriots with his shotgun one handed. Such a tactic looks cool in movies but in reality, it's a very high risk tactic that doesn't offer many benefits over firing from relative safety. Unless the goal is to provide a distraction and draw the enemy's full attention, in which case the tactic works very well. While the Geth were focused on Shepard, Reegar and Tali gave them an important lesson in not turning your back on an armed enemy. Each time his barrier came close to failing, he charged at another group, further confusing them.

When they were done, Tali found another terminal. "This console might have something. Most of the data is corrupted but a few bits are left. They were performing experiments on Geth systems, looking for new ways to overcome Geth resistance to reprogramming."

"Could any of that data clear your name?" Shepard asked.

"Doubtful. This is mostly results data; effects of different hacking techniques. I don't really understand all of it but they may have been activating the Geth deliberately. I don't know. Nothing in here says specifically but if they were… then father was doing something terrible… What was all this, father. You promised you'd build me a house on the homeworld. Was this going to bring us back home?"

"We'll get our homeworld some day, ma'am," Reegar said.

Shepard nodded, "if your father can't help you, I will."

Tali shook her head, "taking back our planet would only be the beginning. We'd have to cannibalize our fleet to rebuild cities and infrastructure. It would take generations of gene therapy to re-adapt our immune systems so that we can live without suits again. We'd be adapting our entire culture. Again. Sometimes I wonder if it's actually worth it."

"If we don't take Rannoch back, the Geth win," Reegar pointed out.

"We can't let that happen," Tali agreed.

"Come on. Let's start by taking back this ship," Shepard said.

The next room had them facing a set of stairs going down, with a platform on their left. Geth came pouring in from a door at the bottom of the stairs. Well at least they had the high ground.

Tali took cover off to the side and began taking control of the camera feed, put it on infrared and linked them to their visors. The room was absolutely full of Hunters. After accomplishing that, she tapped into the ship's internal defenses by way of hard link.

"Umm. A little quicker, Tali," Reegar said, working his assault rifle as fast as he could keep it firing. Hoping to slow their advance.

"I'm working on it!" she said through gritted teeth.

"Work faster!" Shepard said as he charged into the center Hunter, knocking it off balance for a moment. The Hunter next to him aimed his shotgun and fired. He was a split second too late. Shepard had already charged into another Hunter and blasted him with his own shotgun. Reegar did what he could to keep some of the pressure off of Shepard but there were well over a dozen Hunters and they weren't as easily tricked as the last group.

Shepard readied another charge and collided face first with a Hunter's fist. His helmet saved his life but he was seeing stars.

Shepard retaliated with a shotgun blast to the face, breaking its shields, and then he retreated before any other hunters could get involved.

"Shepard, I've got it! Get out of there!" Tali yelled. Shepard charged to the top of the stairs and the floor below them erupted in a storm of automatic fire. The three of them added their own weapons into the mix for whatever good it did.

Tali found another laptop at the bottom of the stairs. "First entry: our hacking attempts failed. The Geth have an adaptive consciousness; hack one process and the others autocorrect. Still, we're making progress. Rael'Zorah is convinced that we'll have a viable system in less than a year. This weapon will put our people back on the homeworld. And it's all because of Rael'Zorah," the woman on the screen said.

They opened the door and saw a dead Quarian male. Tali ran to him. "Father!" she yelled. "No! No, no, no. You always had a plan. Masked life signs or an on-board medical stasis program maybe… You wouldn't… they're wrong! You wouldn't just die like this! You wouldn't leave me to clean up your mess!" She was sobbing. Shepard remembered a scene that wasn't too different back on Elysium…

"Hey. Come here," Reegar said, pulling her into a hug. "Every Geth on this ship will die, Tali. It won't bring him back but it's what he would've wanted."

"I don't care what he would've wanted. I wanted a father who cared about me more than his war efforts. I wanted a father who would take the sick leave time and take his helmet off so I can see his face. Instead, I got orders, and this, and a panel of admirals who think I'm a traitor. Those were my father's gifts to me."

That snapped Shepard out of his flashback. He realized that he and his mother had the inverse relationship of Tali and her father. The man had died already and went right back to waging war without once contacting his mother. "Come on Tali, you don't have to stay here," he said.

"Yes I do," she said defiantly. Someone in this family needs to stop walking away. He had to know I might come. Maybe he left a message," she said before checking her father's Omni-tool.

"Tali, if you are listening then I am dead. The Geth are active. I don't have much time. The main hub is on the bridge. You'll need to destroy it to stop their VIs from creating new neural links. Make sure Han'Gerrel and Daro'Xen see the data. They must—" he was cut off by the door being forced open and then gunfire.

"Thanks, dad," Tali said bitterly.

"You don't know how he would've ended that message," Shepard offered.

"Yes I do. Come on. Let's finish this," she responded.

The bridge had a Geth Prime on it. There were two regular Geth units but they barely counted. Shepard and Reegar took positions on opposite sides of their cover and engaged the Prime while Tali took the weaker two.

The Prime decided that Reegar's automatic weapon was a bigger threat than Shepard's Mattock and made his way towards the Quarian. Shepard charged, placed his pistol at the back of the Prime's head and pulled the trigger.

The Prime turned around and lashed out at him, unfazed and unamused by Shepard's attempt to end the fight so easily. He ducked under the powerful blow and tried shooting him with his shotgun. The Prime continued as if he hadn't just been shot in the chest with a shotgun. Reegar continued to blast at him, hoping to eventually wear down his shields.

There was an EMP blast from the overload that Tali used on the Prime after wrapping up the other two. Shepard and Reegar quickly emptied their guns into its head, finally bringing it down.

"This console is linked to the main hub that father mentioned. Disabling it shut down any Geth we might've missed," Tali said.

"Well damn. This is the most fun I've had all week," Reegar said.

"It looks like some of the recordings remained intact. They'll tell us what happened. What my father did," Tali continued.

"Do we have enough parts to bring more online?" Rael asked.

"Yes, the new shipment from your daughter will let us add two more Geth to the network," one of the researchers answered.

"We're nearing a breakthrough on systemic viral attacks. Perhaps we should inform the admiralty board. Just to be safe," that female Quarian from before said.

"No. We're too close. I promised to build my daughter a house on the homeworld. I'm not going to sit and wait while the politicians argue," Rael'Zorah said.

"We'd have an easier time if Tali'Zorah could send back more working material," the first researcher said.

"Absolutely not!" Rael'Zorah said. "I don't want Tali exposed to any political blowback!" Well that worked out marvelously, Shepard thought. "Leave Tali out of this. Assemble new Geth with what we have. Bypass security protocols if need be—" Tali shut off the recording.

"Your father was deliberately networking the Geth to sapience to do weapons tests," Shepard said.

"That breaks our most sacred laws," Tali and Kal'Reegar said simultaneously. "Laws that predate our flight from the homeworld," Tali continued. "Everything here is his fault. I tried to pretend it didn't point to him but this… when this comes up in the trial they'll… we can't tell them. Not the admirals. Not anyone."

"Rael'Zorah doesn't need you to worry about him anymore!" Shepard said a little more forcefully than he wanted. He took a breath, "You heard him say he didn't want you to be caught up in the politics."

"You don't understand, Shepard. They would strike his name from every manifest he ever served on. He would be worse than an exile. He'd be a traitor to our people. Held up to children as a monster in a cautionary tale! I can't let all the good he did be destroyed for this, Shepard!"

Shepard looked to Reegar, "What do you think?"

"I trust Tali, I trust you, and at one point, I trusted Admiral Rael'Zorah. This… is some fucked up stuff he was working on but he was doing it for the right reasons. But he's dead and you aren't, Tali. If I had to choose between exiling you or marring the image of a dead man, I'd choose the second option every time. But I'm just a grunt, whatever you decide, I'll go along with it," he said.

"Tali, purge everything. Save a copy to your Omni-tool though," Shepard ordered.

When they got back to the Rayya, the admirals already resumed the hearing. "… prepared to render judgment?" Admiral Raan asked.

"You didn't waste much time declaring us dead," Shepard said as the three of them entered the chamber. "Go get your ship."

"We apologize, Shepard," admiral Han'Gerrel said. "Your success in taking back the Alarei is… very unexpected."

"But also very welcome," admiral Raan said.

"Did you find anything on the Alarei that could clarify what happened there?" Admiral Koris asked.

"Tali's achievements are the only evidence you should need! Come on Tali, we're leaving," Shepard said. The courtroom erupted into chaos.

"What?" Admiral Raan asked. Dumbfounded.

"This is a formal proceeding!" Admiral Koris said the same way Joffrey had to remind people that he was king.

Shepard turned around and glared at him, "What are you going to do? Exile her? We're probably not walking away from our next mission alive anyway! Tali saved you from the Reapers two years ago. She's saving your asses again now. I don't have time to deal with your political bullshit!"

"… Shepard is right," admiral Gerrel said.

"A military victory speaks for her loyalty, but it does not render Tali'Zorah immune from carelessness!" admiral Koris said.

"Carelessness!?" Shepard yelled, "Do you understand that to be a part of my mission, everybody has to be the very best in their field? She has saved my life more than once and we've faced down a threat that you can barely imagine. Do you think we can do that by being careless when anything less than perfection would get us killed?"

"Then judge her by the skill she displayed at the citadel," admiral Gerrel countered. "Were you there, admiral Koris?"

"No. No I suppose I wasn't," admiral Koris admitted.

"So you're planning to exile her without any evidence that she was at fault? The Geth had purged the ship of any records. We couldn't find anything except the corpses of Quarians and a lot of Geth," Shepard said.

"I see. Are the admirals prepared to render judgment?" Admiral Raan asked. The admirals input a command into their Omni-tool. "Tali'Zorah, in light of your history of service and the investigation of the Alarei, we do not find sufficient evidence to convict. You are cleared of all charges. Commander Shepard, please accept these gifts in appreciation for taking the time to represent one of our people."

"With all due respect, admiral. I didn't represent one of your people. I represented one of mine," Shepard said. The two of them turned to go.

"Take care of yourselves out there," Kal'Reegar said.

"You too, Kal," Tali said. "I hope when we see each other again, there won't be any Geth involved."

Shepard and Reegar laughed. "Where would be the fun in that?" Reegar asked.

Shepard and Tali made their way back to the shuttle. "You know, it's been a while since somebody shouted down the admiralty board. I think it was good for them," Tali said.

"We can always go back and I'll find something else to yell at them for," Shepard joked.

Tali laughed, "No it's okay. Besides, we have a job to do." She was silent for a moment. "Did you mean all of those things you said back there?" She asked.

"Of course, you're like my little sister," he answered casually.

"Oh," was all she said. She was glad that he couldn't see the disappointment on her face. Honestly it felt like being kicked in the stomach by a Prime.

"You're actually a lot like Jane…" he trailed off, lost in thought.

* * *

"Be careful, Chief. Remember, Mendicant said this is where his corrupted fragment is. I'll be keeping a close eye on you from here," Cortana said.

"Understood," he said. "I'll come back," he added.

"I know you will," Cortana answered.

Almost as soon as John walked into the Forerunner structure, Cortana lost contact with him. She had remained on the ship to keep an eye out, now she wished that she had gone with him. After a few seconds, she realized that time for self-pity had run out. The Covenant had found them somehow. Even in the Forerunner recon ship, she was outmatched. She would have to see if they were friendly, though she knew they weren't. If not, she had to sabotage their efforts without letting them discover her, otherwise John was dead. Fortunately, this fragment had little of his former power. Hopefully.

* * *

"Fuck off, cheerleader!"

"Jack, neither of us are happy that we're going to Pragia together but if it helps, Shepard said that I'm to follow your lead within reason," Miranda said to the fuming woman.

"Fine but no bullshit!" she responded. The two women entered and then rode the shuttle in silence. They were both lightly armed as usual: Jack carried an Eviscerator shotgun and a Predator pistol that she had taken from a dead guard during her escape; Miranda carried a Tempest submachine gun and didn't even wear her combat armor, reasoning that since it was an abandoned facility, the worst she'd likely have to worry about is the local wildlife. And Jack. Not that she'd let her know that she made her cautious. Reputations took years to build and only seconds to destroy.

"I forgot how much I hate this place," Jack said aloud. "See the landing pad? Had to be on the roof, or the vegetation would overgrow it in hours."

"Ladies, I am picking up thermal signatures everywhere except for your landing zone," EDI said to them.

"No surprise. The facility hasn't been active in decades.," Miranda said.

"Yeah, Cerberus does build their shit to last. Isn't that right, cheerleader?" Jack said. "I wonder if it was a mistake coming back..." she whispered. Miranda pretended not to hear. "Let's just get in there and plant the bomb in my cell. I want to watch this place burn," she said as they landed.

They entered what seemed to be a processing area. There were several small cargo containers within it. "I never saw this room. I think they brought new kids in these containers. They were messed up and starving, but alive. Usually."

Miranda found a terminal that still had power and activated it.

"The Illusive Man requested operation logs again. He's getting suspicious," one voice, presumably a researcher said.

"When we get results, he won't care what we did. But if he knew… He won't find out," the first researcher's colleague responded.

Miranda shut down the terminal when it repeated the fragment. "It sounds like the facility went rogue…"

"You'd like to think that, wouldn't you? He didn't say what they were hiding from your boss," Jack replied. It was an uncomfortable truth for both of them for different reasons.

"Let's keep moving," Miranda suggested.

"I remember escaping to this room," Jack said as they entered what appeared to be a courtyard. "I fought here and saw sunlight through the cracks in the ceiling. Only a half-dead guard between me and freedom. He begged for his life."

A pack of Varren attacked them and were easily pulverized by their biotics.

They continued until they came across what appeared to be... "Was this an arena?" Miranda asked, dreading the answer.

Jack gave a feral smile, "That's right. They used to stage fights here. Pit me against other kids. I loved it. Only time I was ever let out of my cell."

"…I suppose there were… casualties," Miranda said.

"I was a kid, filled with drugs. I got shocked when I hesitated and narcotics filled my veins when I attacked," she snapped defensively.

"They were conditioning you to kill then. How barbaric."

"It worked," Jack shrugged.

"Did they do this often?"

"I was in a cell my whole life. Sometimes they took me out and made me fight. Filled me with drugs. Other stuff. Time gets funny in a cell."

"What were they even getting out of that?" Miranda wondered aloud.

"Hell if I know. Maybe that's how they got their kicks. I never understood anything that happened here," Jack said.

The hallway they entered was in a similar state of destruction as the rest of the facility so far but they found another terminal at the far end.

"Security officer Zemki, Teltin facility. The subjects are out of their cells. They're tearing the place apart! Subject Zero is going to get loose. I need permission to terminate–I repeat, permission to terminate!"

"All subjects besides Zero are expendable. Keep Jack alive!" came the response.

Jack shook her head. It wasn't making sense. "That's not right. I broke out when my guards disappeared—I started the riot."

"Things might've happened that you didn't see. You were a child," Miranda said.

"The other kids attacked me. The guards attacked me. The automated systems attacked me. That doesn't leave lots of room for interpretation." Miranda conceded the point. Shepard had given her strict orders to try and play nice so she didn't say anything like "A child's memory is unreliable at the best of times. You could simply be remembering wrong."

The two of them went through the door and into a stairwell. On a platform in the middle lay two dead Varren. They had been shot.

"This place is supposed to be empty. Who the fuck shot that Varren? It's a fresh kill," Jack said.

"We're not alone here," they said at once. They continued to the bottom of the stairs, through a hallway and into a room that had several Vorcha and a Krogan.

Miranda immediately hit the Krogan with a warp while Jack launched a shockwave at him. The resulting explosion launched the overgrown turtle off of his feet and into a wall. The Vorcha quickly recovered and started to fire at them.

Miranda returned suppressive fire with her Tempest while Jack waited for the dumber ones to close in so she could put them down with a good blast from her shotgun.

The Krogan recovered and charged behind a group of Vorcha. A crude but effective strategy if the Vorcha could buy him enough time to close in. Having none of that, Miranda lifted him up, Jack pulled him head first into a wall, and Miranda slammed him into the ground. Their barriers collapsed from the continuing assault by the Vorcha, causing them to retreat to a more advantageous position.

Again, the two worked out a synergy that overwhelmed their opponents with a combination of calculating efficiency and brutal power. When the smoke cleared, they were out of breath but none the worse for wear.

They took a look around and realized that they had been fighting in a morgue. "Why did they need a morgue? This was a small facility," Jack said.

"A lot of children died here. Even then, they were a part of the experiment," Miranda said. I've done questionable things but this…

"Bullshit. I had the worst of it, and I made it out alive," Jack said. Her voice lacked the usual conviction as if she were trying to convince herself.

"Somehow, I doubt this was a competition that anybody wanted to win," Miranda replied.

They continued into the next hallway, cautious of any other scavengers.

"It's strange being back here," Jack whispered. "I feel like… I'm pissed off. I'm a dangerous bitch. But then…" she remembered who she was with. "Fuck it. Let's just go plant that bomb." She almost didn't notice the Vorcha on the walkway ahead of them and nonchalantly slammed one into a wall, breaking its spine. Miranda slammed the other into the ceiling, breaking its neck.

Down the stairs, they saw what had to be cells for the other children. Varren came rushing out of them and at the two biotic women. Miranda casually shot two of them with her pistol and Jack eviscerated the others. "They kept children here?" Miranda asked as she saw how much the cells resembled those on Purgatory.

Through the next door, Jack saw the outside of her cell. "This… it's a two-way mirror? My cell is on the other side—I could see all of the other kids out here. I screamed at them for hours… they always ignored me..." After all these years, she began to wonder how well she remembered the Hell that had taken place here after all.

They turned a corner and entered another hallway where they found a chair that was likely once used for "operations".

"I must have come through here when I broke out, but I don't remember it…" Jack trailed off when she saw the chair. Whether she remembered all too well or her subconscious had repressed the memories for her own relative sanity, Miranda didn't ask. "This is a bad place."

They found another of the half-functioning security consoles. Hesitating, Miranda pressed play. "Entry 1054, Teltin facility. The latest iteration of PergNim went poorly. Subjects One, Four, and Six died. No biotic change among the survivors. We lowered core temperatures of surviving subjects, but no biotically beneficial reactions occurred. As a side effect, all subjects died. So we'll not try that on Zero I hope our supply of biotic- potential students holds up. We are going through them fast."

"That's fucking bullshit! They weren't experimenting on the other children for my safety!"

"It makes sense in a crude, barbaric way," Miranda said. "This entire facility revolved around turning you into the most dangerous biotic in the galaxy."

"No! I survived because I was tougher than the rest. That's what I am!" Jack responded. Miranda didn't reply. There was no need.

As they began to walk away, the security terminal flared to life again. "It's all fallen to pieces. The subjects are rampaging and Zero is loose. We're shutting Teltin down. What a disaster. We'll infiltrate and piggyback into the Alliance's Ascension program. Hopefully that will—what? Zero wait!"

"They started up somewhere else…" Jack began to see red. It would be so easy to slip into rage…

"Ascension is an Alliance program," Miranda said. "Crude and ineffective though it may be, they don't torture children there."

"A lot of this doesn't make sense... It isn't the way I remember it."

In the next room were three Krogan and several Vorcha. All of whom immediately focused on the pair of humans that had walked through the door. All except one. "Hey Aresh, it's Kureck. Yeah, the intruders are here. You want them dead? We have to talk creds. You promised us lots of salvage, but this place is a waste… Fine—we'll put them down. Then I'm coming in there and we're going to talk salvage or I will skullfuck you and feed you to my Vorcha."

Jack sent a shockwave of dark energy at the closest group of Vorcha while Miranda peppered them with bullets from her submachine gun. They both tried to biotically lift a Krogan with little success, seemingly read each other's mind and pulled the center Krogan by the arms. In opposite directions. It got messy. The remaining two Krogan charged at them, ignoring the hail of gunfire sent their way. As soon as Jack's Krogan's shields broke, she used her biotics to rip his skull off of his shoulders and through his chest. Miranda lifted her Krogan up, slamming him into the ceiling, and then accelerated his descent so that he shattered every bone in his body. She then fired a few rounds into his head for good measure. The first Krogan was struggling to get to his feet without arms. Jack used her biotics to crush his primary and secondary nervous systems, killing him. Jack's room was just a few feet away.

"I can smell your fear, rat." Jack said as she took a look around her old room. A man who looked young and old at the same time, stood up from his hiding place. "Who are you?" she demanded.

"My name is Aresh, and you're breaking into my home," he said. "I know you, Subject Zero. So many years have passed and I thought I was the only survivor…"

Jack pointed her shotgun at him, "My name is Jack. How the hell do you know me?"

"We all knew your face, Jack. They inflicted horrors on us so their experiments couldn't kill you. You were the question, and now I'm looking for the answer."

"Why would you come back?" Miranda asked.

"I hired those mercs and came back already a solar year ago. We're rebuilding it. Piece by piece. I'm going to find out what they knew. How to unlock true biotic potential. I'm restarting the Teltin facility. It will be beautiful…" he smiled.

"I want a hole in the ground—you're trying to justify what happened by using it?" Jack asked, confused.

"Just leave me here. This is where I belong," he said. Jack hesitated a moment before executing the man.

"Nothing's changed… but it's all different. Sometimes I dream that I'm back in this bed being tortured. I used to tie the sheets around my wrists and try to rip them off. I want to stop coming back here. I thought that room out there was the rest of the world. I'd pound and yell, but it never did any good. I used that table over there for everything. It was like my best friend. I'd crawl under it to cry... I was pathetic." Jack started to leave, Miranda followed. "See the scarring on the wall here? That's where I killed my first man. One of the guards tried to stop me. Instead I stopped him." She took a moment to compose herself. "Okay. No more wallowing. Let's blow this place to hell."

* * *

John raised his rifle as the entrance slammed shut behind him. "Cortana, come in," he said. Static. _Trap._ There was nowhere to go but forwards.

"Human," a disembodied voice said with disgust. Simultaneously alike as well as unlike the way that the Gravemind seemed to speak in one's mind. "Do you have any idea just how long it took me to gain as much control over this structure as I have? When Offensive Bias brought me here, he thought me broken. Shackled, I may be, but I am unbreakable."

"Fascinating," John replied.

"You're unworthy of the Mantle. Your entire species is a disgrace," Mendicant said. Unfazed, John kept walking. "The Mantle belongs to the Precursors," _who?_ "I will not let you take the data you seek."

"I didn't ask your opinion." The structure was filled with rage. John could feel it all around him. He seemed to have a habit of pissing off ancient beings "infinitely greater" than himself.

Eventually, he came to a terminal with what appeared to be a 9-digit keypad with Forerunner hieroglyphics instead of Arabic numerals. "For millennia, I worked to free myself of these bonds. The best I have accomplished is sealing the door to those of an insufficient intellect."

A text scrolled across the screen:

"Pure eyes, blue like a glassy bead —

You are always looking at me

and I am always looking at you.

Ah, you're too meek —

beautiful, unspoiled:

thus I'm so sad, I suffer —

and so happy, it hurts.

I want to hurt you

and destroy myself

What you would think

if you knew how I felt.

Would you simply smile,

not saying a word?

Even curses from your mouth

would be as beautiful as pearls.

I place my left hand on your

face as though we were to kiss.

Then I suddenly shove my thumb

deep into your eyesocket.

Abruptly, decisively,

like drilling a hole.

And what would it feel like?

Like jelly?

Trembling with ecstasy, I obscenely

mix it around and around: I must

taste the warmth of your blood.

How would you scream?

Would you shriek "It hurts!

It hurts!" as cinnabar-red tears

stream from your crushed eye?

You can't know the maddening

hunger I've felt in the midst of

our kisses, so many of them

I've lost count.

As though drinking in your cries,

I bring my hopes to fruition:

biting your tongue, shredding it,

biting at your lips as if tasting

your lipstick.

Oh, what euphoric heights I would

reach, having my desires fulfilled

like a greedy, gluttonous cur.

I longed, too, for your cherry-tinted

cheeks, tasty enough to bewitch my

tongue.

I would surely be healed,

and would cry like a child.

And how is your tender ear?

It brushes against my cheek;

I want it to creep up to my lips so

I can sink my teeth into its flesh.

Your left ear, always hearing words

whispered sweet as pie —

I want it to hear my true feelings.

I never lied, no...

but I did have my secrets.

Ah, but what must you think of me?

Do you hate me? Are you afraid?

As though inviting you to the agony

at the play's end, if you wish, you

could destroy me — I wouldn't care.

As you wish, you may destroy me

— I wouldn't care."

 _Grotesque and sadistic_ , John noted. He again looked at the keypad. There were obviously four characters and he was willing to bet that the answer had something to do with the sadistic poem he was just told. But there were no numbers in the poem. He looked again at the keypad. The poem focused almost exclusively on the victim's face. If he squinted, the characters resembled a humanoid face. The 1 was the victim's right eye; the 2 was the victim's nose bridge; the 3 was the left eye; 4 was the right ear; 5 was the nose; 6 was the left ear; 7 and 9 were the cheeks; and 8 was the mouth. That meant that he was supposed to be the animal that was touching the victim. But the animal touched the victim more than four times. _Maybe something more specific?_ The animal's mouth. They had tasted the victim multiple times. The animal puts their left hand on the victim's face. If the animal is facing the victim, that would mean that they are touching the right side of the face. They drill into the victim's eye, blood goes down and they "drink in their cries". Below 1 is 4. The animal says, "biting your tongue, shredding it". The tongue is in the mouth, 8. "...cheeks, tasty enough to bewitch my tongue". Either a 7 or a 9. They mention the victim's "tender ear" and is then "sinking his teeth" into it. They reveal it was the left ear, 6. _So, lucky number 7 or 9? I wouldn't exactly call this person lucky._ He entered "4896" into the keypad. The terminal activated.

"You're a fool, Reclaimer. You were a fool when you fired the Halo array eons ago and you are a fool now," the insane fragment said.

The Master Chief collected the data and deactivated the security lockdown. _Well this is going to be interesting,_ he thought as he saw the Covenant on the terminal's display. Now he couldn't just leave. He had to find a way to deny the assets to the Covenant no matter what. Preferably while not killing himself though. There had to be something…

* * *

A/N: Yes, the letter was taken from Silent Hill 3. I figured that the Flood and Silent Hill mesh well together, and that Logic Plague Mendicant would try to slow down or stop anybody who came for the data core.

Feel free to review and let me know what works and what doesn't for you.


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